What did Ukraine's parliament look like after Razumkov's removal?
A retrospective on the days around 11 October 2021, when the Verkhovna Rada had a new speaker after a dismissal tied to disputes over oligarch legislation.
What did Ukraine's parliament look like on 11 October 2021? It was a chamber that had just changed its leadership, three days after electing a new speaker and four days after dismissing the previous one.
On 7 October 2021, the Verkhovna Rada voted to remove Dmytro Razumkov from the post of speaker. As reported at the time, his dismissal followed disagreements with President Volodymyr Zelensky and with the stance of the ruling Servant of the People party on legislation meant to reduce the influence of Ukrainian oligarchs.
On 8 October 2021, the Rada elected Ruslan Stefanchuk as its new speaker. The change therefore took place within two days, and by 11 October the parliament was working under new leadership.
The chamber involved was the ninth convocation of the Verkhovna Rada, which sits in Kyiv and began its term on 29 August 2019. The leadership change came well into that term, and it marked a visible break between the speaker and the party that held the majority.
A wider diplomatic backdrop
Outside Ukraine, relations between Russia and NATO were also under strain in the same week. On 6 October 2021, NATO expelled eight members of the Russian Mission to NATO, accusing them of secretly operating as intelligence officers. The alliance also reduced the number of Russian positions at the organisation to 10.
The two developments were separate, and nothing links them directly. Together, though, they show how much was going on around Ukraine's public life that week: a domestic shake-up in parliament over the question of oligarch influence, and a sharp deterioration in the diplomatic relationship between Moscow and the alliance.
What remained to be seen
On 11 October 2021, the central question for the Rada was how the new speakership would handle the legislation that had divided Razumkov from the president and the governing party. That was the debate that had ended in his dismissal, and it was left to the chamber under Stefanchuk to carry forward.
