UPDATED: Servant of the People Chooses New Leader

Party representatives have chosen a new head for the ruling Servant of the People party – former parliamentary faction deputy leader Oleksandr Korniyenko.

Delegates chose Korniyenko during a party convention in Kyiv. Korniyenko was the only candidate for the post.

A new leader was needed after former head Dmytro Razumkov lost his authority on becoming the Speaker of Parliament, which prevented him from leading a party.

At the convention, Korniyenko spoke about three key priorities for political power in the next four years: “The party needs to work on three concrete directions, which I, as candidate for party leader, want to propose. The first is qualitative change in politics on a local level, the second is a new quality approach to party-building, and third is the transformation of the party into a center for implementing important political solutions in the country, and preparing a new political elite for Ukraine.”

Korniyenko added that “Parties of a new type are a social elevator, which will push people who care to the front of the national political stage. They will, by combining education and practice, turn into politicians of a new type...For this elevator to work, the party must be sexy and arousing to MPs.”

Along with Korniyenko's three new directions,  he also said that Servant of the People will be changing their party's ideology. Previously, the party espoused a libertarian philosophy, which will now be changed to, in the words of Korniyenko, "something between liberal and socialist views." According to Korniyenko, this change was taken out of the necessity to find compromises within the party.