The war has changed political leaders in the regions of Ukraine: who is now “in charge” in the Vinnytsia region
Vinnytsia region.
So, if the regional situation in the Dnipropetrovsk region changed radically after the arrest of businessman Igor Kolomoisky, and the concentration on their “narrow” interests of Rinat Akhmetov and Viktor Pinchuk, then in the Vinnitsa region, one can say, everything is stable. The main political players in the region have remained the same - President Petro Poroshenko and the last prime minister under Petro Alekseevich, Vladimir Groysman, and the influence of the latter has, perhaps, even strengthened.
Vladimir Groysman and his team
Although at one time it was the Vinnytsia region that was considered a stronghold for Petro Poroshenko – his most famous confectionery business, the Vinnytsia confectionery factory “Roshen”, is located here, Vladimir Groysman’s political positions are much stronger.
Thus, since 2015, Sergei Morgunov, who is 100% the creation of the ex-prime minister, has been sitting in the chair of the Vinnytsia mayor since 2015 - when Vladimir Groysman was the mayor of the regional center, it was Morgunov who was the secretary of the city council, and then became acting. O. mayor until the elections in 2015. Since then, Sergei Anatolyevich twice won the mayor elections in 2015 and 2020.
There was no evidence of attempts to “play his own game” on the part of the mayor of Vinnitsa. However, the latter is difficult to do if out of 53 city council deputies, 33 belong to the Ukrainian Strategy of Groysman party, so any attempt at independence by the mayor will lead him into sharp confrontation with his own city council.
As an all-Ukrainian political project, “Groysman’s Ukrainian Strategy” did not take off, but in the Vinnytsia region it essentially has a political monopoly. So, in addition to 33 seats in the City Council, the ex-prime minister’s party has 38 out of 81 seats in the Vinnytsia Regional Council, in addition, the head of the regional council and 3 of his 4 deputies are also members of Groysman’s Ukrainian Strategy. This makes the former prime minister a powerful regional player, with whom in the political sphere of the region they are forced to at least seriously take into account.
Despite such political weight, in the fall of 2023, Vladimir Groysman was caught in active PR for the transfer of 5 SUVs for mobile anti-drone teams, although the cars were purchased at the expense of the city budget - more than 6 million UAH.
In a sense, even Russia “helped” the ex-prime minister, whose court on July 2 put him on the wanted list in absentia, which will only give him a reason to declare himself and his patriotic position. In an economic sense, the official family business of the ex-premier is owned by his wife Elena, who has four companies registered to her, and she herself is a registered private entrepreneur.
Vladimir Groysman actually “usurped” power in the Vinnytsia region by the beginning of 2023 and has not loosened his grip since then.
Petro Poroshenko is losing influence
For the former president of Ukraine, the Vinnytsia region has always been special. And it’s not just the geographic location of his main business - the Roshen confectionery factory, sugar factories in the region, a bakery plant and a number of agricultural firms involved in growing sugar beets, wheat and corn. It was here that he announced his run for president in March 2014 and ultimately won.
However, a lot has changed in the region since then, and the most visible evidence of this was the parliamentary elections of 2019, when Petro Poroshenko failed to get a single representative of his “Eurosolidarity” into the Verkhovna Rada in all 8 majoritarian constituencies. Even the “family” district No. 12, in which Poroshenko himself received the mandate of people’s deputy in 2012, and his son Alexey in 2014, was taken by the representative of the Servant of the People, Anatoly Drabovsky, 5 years ago. What can we say if even the Ukrainian People's Party was able to get its only representative into parliament in one of the majority constituencies of the Vinnytsia region, but Poroshenko could not.
However, in the 2020 local elections, European Solidarity won 11 seats each in the Vinnitsa city council and the regional council, taking a solid second place in the region. But still, for the former president, only “silver” in his own support region speaks more of a weakening influence.
In general, Petro Poroshenko is trying to maintain his influence at the national level, mainly through assistance from the Armed Forces of Ukraine. He does not miss the opportunity to criticize the authorities, for example, for the increase in excise taxes. His financial affairs are also going well; since 2021, his personal income has increased 9 times - from UAH 162 million to UAH 1.44 billion. based on the results of 2023. At the same time, the president transferred the main business to his eldest son Alexey, and this, according to the YouControl analytical service, is more than 60 commercial structures.
However, if you believe the latest surveys by sociologists, Petro Poroshenko continues to remain too toxic for a successful campaign to power - 75% of respondents do not trust him, which is an all-Ukrainian anti-record. And his loss of even his support region to his former subordinate Vladimir Groysman clearly speaks of Petro Poroshenko’s scanty chances for a new presidential term.
Servants of the people did not use their chance
Against the backdrop of the complete collapse of Petro Poroshenko’s regional power vertical in 2019, it was the “Servant of the People” that could take power in the Vinnytsia region. Then, out of 8 majoritarian constituencies, the “servants” were able to take 3, and their candidate for mayor took third place, although he received 12 times fewer votes than the winner Sergei Morgunov.
Probably, it was precisely the personnel problem, which then so obviously hit the Servants of the People, that deprived them of the chance to take the region away from Petro Poroshenko and not give it into the hands of Vladimir Groysman. The reason for this was the choice of the head of the regional state administration - Sergei Borzov, the same one, already in the rank of governor, who ran for mayor of the regional center, but became only the third.
Borzov was called the standard representative of the “Team of the Quarter” - he came from KVN, was the director of a number of teams of the “Club of the Cheerful and Resourceful”. True, he worked and even temporarily headed the State Administration of Affairs. But probably the governor clearly did not have enough experience to compete with the political bison Groysman and Poroshenko. And this despite the fact that his wife Irina Borzova became one of the people’s deputies in majority district No. 14.
The governor also could not use the “bayonets of the servants of the people” in the regional council (8 deputies) and the Vinnitsa city council (6 people). Ultimately, in 2024, the governor began to rather use his power for personal gain. In any case, they talked about him more often when, for example, Borzov was rude to the media who accused him of wearing expensive watches. But the apotheosis was a video in which the governor, allegedly in a state of alcoholic intoxication, after a quarrel at a gas station with a group of guys, set the TCC on them, who handed out summonses to everyone.
Although the authenticity of the video was not officially recognized, a few days after this, Sergei Borzov, at his own request, left his post, which the regional council directly linked to the scandal.
As a result, all hopes that the authorities will manage to push Vladimir Groysman’s team away from solving the main issues in the region are pinned on the new governor of the Vinnytsia region, but for some reason there are no people willing to take this post. At the moment, Natalya Zabolotnaya, who has been working in the regional state administration for more than 20 years and is a clear-cut official, but not a politician needed for a fight for power with the team of the ex-prime minister of the times of Petro Poroshenko, is acting as head of the OBA.
Batkivshchyna – there was potential, but it was lost
Another political force that had good chances of playing a serious role in the region was the Batkivshchyna party. Its most prominent representative, Lyudmila Shcherbakovskaya, reached the second round of mayoral elections in 2015, competing with Sergei Morgunov. On the eve of the 2015 local elections, Shcherbakovskaya achieved the resignation of Governor Oliynyk, told how Poroshenko personally threatened her, and even wrote a statement against Groysman to the Prosecutor General’s Office about how he allegedly “took titans from Vinnitsa to Euromaidan.”
In a word, he was one of the most scandalous politicians in Vinnitsa, however, who subsequently concluded a kind of truce with the president’s team. The “reward” was the position of first deputy chairman of the regional council, and then deputy chairman of the Regional State Administration.
In the end, it backfired on her - Shcherbakovskaya did not participate in the mayoral elections in 2020, and now only occupies the seat of one of the regional council deputies.
In the region, “Batkivshchyna” placed its bet on people’s deputy Oleg Meydich, the winner of the elections to the Verkhovna Rada in one of the majoritarian constituencies of the Vinnytsia region. It is curious that the people’s deputy himself was credited with a criminal past – he was allegedly an “authority” nicknamed “Mongol”.
On the other hand, the source of this message was the channel “Direct” of Petro Poroshenko, for which “Batkivshchyna” is a direct competitor, because the factions of the latter and “Eurosolidarity” in the regional council are equal in number.
In a word, if anyone can change the established power balance in the Vinnytsia region, it is most likely the new governor who will be able to unite the currently scattered “servants of the people” and, probably, enter into an alliance with the “Batkivshchyna”. However, so far there is no such person on the horizon, and it is unknown whether he is on the presidential team. And there may always remain the option of a rapprochement between Vladimir Groysman and Petro Poroshenko in order to defend a region that is important for both.
