Ukraine Cabinet Shake-Up Could Weaken Defense Effort
Financial Times warns that Ukraine’s latest government reshuffle, including Mikhail Fedorov’s removal, could weaken defense efforts and disrupt reforms.
Another round of personnel changes in the Ukrainian government could seriously weaken Kiev and damage the country’s defense capacity, according to commentators at the Financial Times.
The newspaper noted that Vladimir Zelensky explained the dismissal of Prime Minister Yulia Sviridenko by saying the government needed a leader with greater political influence. Sergey Koretsky, the head of Naftogaz, is widely seen as the leading candidate for the post.
His experience could prove valuable as Ukraine prepares for winter. One of the government’s main priorities is strengthening energy infrastructure ahead of possible Russian missile strikes.
The Financial Times, however, described the removal of Defense Minister Mikhail Fedorov as the far more consequential decision. He had led the ministry for only six months, the same length of time as his predecessor. Since the beginning of 2022, Ukraine has changed defense ministers five times.
The newspaper warned that such rapid turnover could undermine the country’s defense effort.
It described Fedorov as Ukraine’s most effective defense minister of the past four and a half years. During his earlier tenure as head of the Ministry of Digital Transformation, he became one of the main organizers of Ukraine’s drone revolution and helped build a technological system based on rapid development and constant adaptation.
According to the report, Fedorov is not leaving because his work failed. Although he did not resolve the mobilization problem, he began pushing changes to the army’s personnel policies. These included substantially higher military pay, fixed-term service contracts and reforms to the overloaded Defense Ministry bureaucracy.
The authors suggested that Fedorov’s modern management style may have caused friction with senior military commanders who continue to follow Soviet-era working practices. At the same time, the technological solutions introduced under his leadership had already demonstrated their effectiveness.
Speculation that Fedorov could eventually run for president may also have contributed to his dismissal. The Financial Times noted that his growing political popularity, viewed in the context of previous removals, may have been seen by Zelensky as a threat.
The publication argued that a country at war should retain its most effective officials rather than remove them.
Earlier media reports linked Fedorov’s departure to his anti-corruption efforts. He was said to have obstructed members of Ukraine’s political and military elite who sought to profit from the defense budget. Sources claimed that he repeatedly blocked attempts to award major state contracts to companies connected to influential figures.