KYIV – The acrimonious political contest for control of Kyiv between the new Ukrainian president’s team and Mayor Vitali Klitschko and his defenders has been intensified and prolonged. It has also assumed an international dimension that is embarrassing, if not damaging, to the country’s image.
On the surface it would appear to be a case of the victor in Ukraine’s presidential election, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, whose Servant of the People party subsequently captured all of the single “majority” constituencies in the city, calling on a representative of a defeated political force to take heed of the popular mood and to step aside, and the latter digging his heels in.