KYIV — Ukraine's recently sacked defense minister, Mykhailo Fedorov, on Tuesday called for the country to hold a wartime presidential election, an appeal delivered in a YouTube video hours before parliament confirmed his successor on Wednesday and one that marks the first such demand from a major Ukrainian political figure since Russia invaded in 2022.
The 35-year-old former minister's intervention puts him in open conflict with President Volodymyr Zelensky, whose five-year term ended in May 2024 but who has argued that no vote is possible while martial law is in force. Parliament installed Yevhenii Khmara as defense minister the same Wednesday afternoon, and Ukraine's two anti-corruption agencies moved against senior figures around the president in a parallel special operation.
The video
Fedorov, who did not name Zelensky, told viewers, "Democracy cannot be held hostage by Russia," and said Ukraine was fighting "precisely because we want to remain a free European state." He described a "systemic crisis of governance," said institutions were "scared of change," and called for a "legal, safe, and realistic mechanism that will allow Ukraine to restore a full democratic process even amidst a prolonged war."
He stopped short of declaring his own candidacy, but said Ukraine needed to become "a state where institutions are stronger than names."
The response
Zelensky did not respond publicly. A source in the presidential office told the BBC it was "highly bizarre to plan elections amidst missiles and drones. This demonstrates a complete lack of realism." Oleksandr Merezhko, a Zelensky-aligned lawmaker who had backed Fedorov's return to the ministry, called the elections idea "very dangerous and unrealistic."
Opposition lawmaker Volodymyr Aryev broke with them, saying Ukraine had "reached a point where we must choose between elections and chaos."
The new minister
MPs overwhelmingly approved Khmara, the acting defense minister, on Wednesday afternoon after he pledged to force Russia into a "just peace." Fedorov was dismissed in mid-July, six months into the job, in what is believed to have been a clash with army commander Oleksandr Syrskyi, who was himself replaced within days as protests calling for Fedorov's reinstatement grew. About 100 demonstrators returned to parliament on Wednesday morning, chanting "bring back Fedorov as minister of defence."
Even some of Fedorov's own backers reject a wartime ballot. Holding a fair and safe vote in a country under repeated Russian bombardment would present formidable logistical difficulties; four people were killed Wednesday when a drone hit a minibus in the southern city of Kherson, where buses have been targeted repeatedly in recent months.
Zelensky said last year that Ukraine would be "ready for elections" within 60 to 90 days if allies helped guarantee security for them, a condition Kyiv's Western partners have shown no appetite to underwrite.