President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has asked Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy Yuliya Svyrydenko to head the Cabinet of Ministers. He announced this on 14 July.
Zelenskyy held a meeting with her. He offered her to revamp the work of the Cabinet of Ministers.
‘I offered Yuliya Svyrydenko to head the Ukrainian government and significantly revamp its work. I expect the new government's action programme to be presented in the near future,’ he said.
Svyrydenko reported to the president on the implementation of agreements with European and American partners regarding support for Ukraine, which were reached during the recent recovery conference.
‘We must implement as quickly as possible everything that can support the stability of our state and society. We also discussed specific measures that can strengthen Ukraine's economic potential, expand support programmes for Ukrainians and scale up our own weapons production. To this end, we are beginning to transform the executive branch in Ukraine,’ the president said.
Replacement of the government
This summer, the possible resignation of the government was discussed for the first time. The same thing happened last year, and even then Svyrydenko was named as a candidate for the post of prime minister. However, at that time, the matter did not go beyond discussions, and Denys Shmyhal retained his post. It is also important to remember that Article 10 of the law on martial law explicitly prohibits the resignation of the government, and replacing the prime minister automatically leads to this.
For several weeks this summer, the press discussed a possible new replacement for the Cabinet. And while there are different opinions about who could replace the current ministers, the press sources are unanimous on the issue of the prime minister – they name Svyrydenko. People's Deputy Yaroslav Zheleznyak wrote about this in June. At the same time, he later claimed that the fate of the government had not yet been decided.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, commenting on the possible replacement of Denys Shmyhal, said that if he had such an intention, he would first discuss it with the prime minister himself, not with journalists. He added that he had not had such a conversation with him.
On 11 July, Yuliya Svyrydenko told the press that she had not been offered to head the government.
On 14 July, Zelenskyy held a meeting with Denys Shmyhal.
Who is Yuliya Svyrydenko?
Yuliya Svyrydenko, a native of Chernihiv, has headed the Ministry of Economy since 2021. Prior to that, since 2020, she was deputy head of the Office of the President. Earlier, in 2018, she was acting head of the Chernihiv Regional State Administration.
While working in the Office of the President, Svyrydenko headed the Business Facilitation Council. In 2020-2021, she was a member of the Ukrainian delegation to the Trilateral Contact Group on the peaceful settlement in eastern Ukraine and a representative in the working subgroup on socio-economic issues.