Corruption Sinks a Nation and May Turn a Comedian Into President
Ukraine holds an election on March 31 at a vulnerable time.
Ukrainian comic actor and presidential candidate Volodymyr Zelenskiy enters a hall in Kiev on March 6, 2019, to take part in the shooting of the television series Servant of the People, where he plays the role of president of Ukraine.
Photographer: Sergei Supinsky/AFP/Getty Images
There’s nothing funny about why a comedian is getting a shot at becoming president of Ukraine, a country at war.
In dramatic revolutions of 2004 and 2014, Ukrainians have twice sought to buck a political system in which wealthy oligarchs appeared to take turns milking the state. Both attempts to root out systemic corruption are widely seen as failures, despite a new antigraft agency and sweeping bank cleanup.