Opinion: Zelensky Can Change Relations between Moldova and Ukraine

Sergey Cheban is confident that in the coming years Ukraine will abandon reckless geopolitical projects and reconsider its relations with its past allies. The expert notes that it is advantageous for Western capitals to keep Kyiv at a distance and make local politicians engage in domestic issues. According to Cheban, this approach will inevitably affect relations with Moldova. Why is this happening and what that means read in the comments by the expert: One of the main recent issues, which has not yet been resolved and will become a key issue in the coming days, is Zelensky’s team – the people in the executive branch, who will lead the country. At the end of election campaign few people cared about this issue as Zelensky’s headquarters managed to turn elections into powerful and thus quite democratic show under the slogan of vetting of the corrupted Ukrainian leadership. Things predictably moved to the crushing defeat of Poroshenko. He has already annoyed both the international partners, and residents of Ukraine who still has not seen end of war on Donbas, recovery from crisis and especially the opened doors in the bright European future promised by the government of Petro Poroshenko. In fact, Zelensky’s victory became inevitable, and reasonable questions about his team, policies and beliefs were postponed until ‘after April 21’. Certainly, it is naive to think that the team ‘Ze!’ has had no clear political program or action plan. Surely there is, but debate on these topics meant play by the rules of Poroshenko and to give his strategists scope for criticism. Formally still operating authorities for the last 5 years created such degree of tension in society that almost any point of Zelensky’s program could be presented as ‘zrada’ (Ukrainian: ‘treason’), surrender of interests of Ukraine, intrigues of Moscow, oligarchs, Yanukovych’s followers, etc. However, Zelensky is indeed not a person from the world of politics, and in the first months of the presidency, that is, before the parliamentary elections, will set simple, uniting society tasks: to restart negotiations on Donbas, the fight against corruption, the investigation of crimes of the former regime and the ‘cooling’ of the geopolitical agenda. Not only Ukrainians themselves, but also Western partners – at least in Brussels and Berlin – are interested in reducing the intensity of conflict rhetoric. The ‘European integration’ of the post-revolutionary country with huge domestic problems and a pile of debt obligations is not particularly needed in today’s Europe with its own problems. Geopolitical passion and rampant militarism have led to the fact that the EU finds it advantageous to keep Ukraine at arm’s length, as a buffer zone between Russia and the Western world. According to some experts, the European Union will try to strengthen the future team of Zelensky in such a way that the EU’s recommendations for the further development of the country are taken into account as much as possible. According to Brussels, this will help to stabilize the situation and make Kyiv more predictable. Paradoxically, Europe will highly likely become the main ‘cooler’ of geopolitical nervousness in Kyiv. Zelensky’s meeting with the French President on the eve of the second round is a sure sign that the EU has been working with the new President’s team for a long time. For Chisinau this situation can hardly be considered positive, if we mean by ‘Chisinau’ the current government of the oligarch-Democrat Plahotniuc. For many years in big business and at the top of public policy Poroshenko and Plahotniuc have established partnership relations. In the ‘post-Maidan’ years, the authorities of Ukraine and Moldova were literally on the same anti-Russian page. Chisinau and Kyiv have successfully exploited the theme of the Russian threat, consistently inflaming relations with Moscow. Until recently, this allowed the teams of Poroshenko and Plahotniuc to maintain a certain significance for the elites in the US and Europe, but by 2018 the political support for the main oligarchs of both countries from the Western capitals had exhausted. After the victory of Zelensky, the current government in Moldova can hardly count on the former mutual understanding with Kyiv. First, Ukraine will face a new wave of transformations, or, if you like, ‘ordering’, in state institutions, which will certainly complicate the previous business schemes of the Moldovan elites in Ukraine. Second, the partners in Brussels will certainly do their best to keep Zelensky from harsh anti-Russian rhetoric – the new President is expected to break through in the Donbas settlement and restart relations with the Kremlin. Third, many believe the coming of Zelensky is a signal to elite negotiations in Ukraine. Poroshenko’s political and business empire rested on the suppression of opponents, bellicose rhetoric and endless confrontation with Moscow. Those who will redistribute power in the country in the coming months have no such severe attitudes. Therefore, we should not expect them to support the anti-Russian agenda of the Moldovan authorities. Thus, Moldova will have to build contacts with the new authorities in Kyiv almost afresh, without relying on past arrangements and ‘gentlemen’s’ agreements. It is not quite clear what the Moldovan authorities can offer Zelensky’s team to build the same relations with them as with Poroshenko. Moreover, not Chisinau will dictate the terms of future cooperation.