Ukrainian Parliament Elects New Leaders (UPDATED)

29 August 2019 16:23

The new parliament has had a busy first day – Ukraine has a new PM, Cabinet and PG. It also elected its chairman and two deputy chairpersons.

August 29 brought Ukraine a new prime minister after the parliament approved the candidacy of lawyer Oleksiy Honcharuk.

Andriy Zahorodnyuk has been appointed as Defense Minister of Ukraine. 314 MPs voted in favor. According to the legislation, the candidature for the position of the head of the Ministry of Defense is put forward by the president.

Expectedly, Vadym Prystaiko, head of Ukraine's Mission to NATO and now former Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs got the Foreign Minister post.

The MPs also supported Ivan Bakanov's candidacy for the post of head of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU). Bakanov is Volodymyr Zelenskyy's childhood friend.

Ukraine's Parliament also dismissed Yuriy Lutsenko from the post of Prosecutor General and appointed Ruslan Ryaboshapka as the new head of the PGO. President Zelenskyy later approved this appointment.

Late on Thursday, the Parliament voted with 281 votes in favor for Arsen Avakov to remain Minister of Internal Affairs, Mykhailo Fedorov to take the position of Vice Prime Minister for Digital Transformation, and Dmytro Kuleba to become Vice Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration.

Other ministerial positions are distributed as follows:

Minister of Energy and Ecology - Oleksiy Orzhel;
Minister for Community and Territorial Development - Alyona Babak;
Minister of Infrastructure - Vladyslav Krykliy;
Minister of Finance - Oksana Markarova;
Minister of Economic Development, Trade and Agriculture - Tymofiy Mylovanov;
Minister of Youth and Sports, as well as Culture and Information Policy - Volodymyr Borodyanskyi;
Minister of Justice - Denys Malyus'ka;
Minister of Education and Science - Hanna Novosad;
Minister of Health - Zoryana Skaletska;
Minister of Social Policy - Yulia Sokolovska;
Minister for Veterans, Temporarily Occupied Territories and Internally Displaced Persons of Ukraine - Oksana Koliada;
Minister of the Cabinet of Ministers - Dmytro Dubilet.

Besides, the leader of the Servant of the People party Dmytro Razumkov was elected as the chairman of the parliament with 382 votes in his favor. Another Servant of the People MP, Ruslan Stefanchuk, was elected as the deputy chairman. Later, Batkivshchyna faction MP Olena Kondratyuk also became a deputy chairperson of the parliament from the opposition.

The biggest Ukrainian political party also announced that they won't be forming a coalition with any of the political parties. Their parliamentary majority allows them to implement most decisions without help from other MPs.

During the same session, Razumkov also announced the names of the leaders of all the parliament's factions. David Arakhamia was named as the head of the Servant of the People faction, journalist Serhiy Rakhmanin as the leader of the Golos faction. Unsurprisingly, Yulia Tymoshenko was announced the head of her Batkivshchyna faction, and Yuriy Boyko with Vadym Novinskyi will head Opposition Platform - For Life faction. Petro Poroshenko's European Solidarity faction, which has already announced that it will be in the opposition, will be jointly led by Artur Herasymov and Iryna Herashchenko.

Moreover, a separate deputy group For Future was created, also with two heads: Taras Batenko and Viktor Bondar.

To end the day parliamentarians approved the list of parliamentary committees, as well as their heads in two separate resolutions. A total of 23 committees have been created by the MPs:

1. Committee on Agrarian Policy;
2. Committee on Anti-Corruption Policy;
3. Committee on Budget;
4. Committee on Humanitarian and Information Policy;
5. Committee on Environmental Policy;
6. Committee on Economic Development;
7. Committee on Energy and Housing;
8. Committee on Nation Health, Medical Assistance, and Health Insurance;
9. Committee on Foreign Policy and Interparliamentary Cooperation;
10. Committee on Ukraine's Integration with the E.U.;
11. Committee on Youth and Sports;
12. Committee on National Security;
13. Committee on the Organization of State Power, Local Self-Government, Regional Development and Urban Development;
14. Committee on Education, Science and Innovation;
15. Committee on Human Rights and Reintegration of Temporarily Occupied Territories;
16. Committee on Legal Policy;
17. Committee on Law Enforcement;
18. Committee on Regulation, Parliamentary Ethics and Organization of Parliamentary Work;
19. Committee on Freedom of Speech;
20. Committee on Social Policy and Veterans' Rights;
21. Committee on Transport and Infrastructure;
22. Committee on Finance, Tax and Customs Policy;
23. Committee on Digital Transformation.