After Dynasty: A country of horizontal ties and vertical catastrophe

Once the fuss over the court hearing on pre-trial restrictions for former head of the President's Office, Andrii Yermak, dies down; once all the jokes about Veronika Fengshui and her influence over the country's personnel policy during wartime come to an end – we as a society will need to think seriously about the conclusions and the lessons.

Of course, Ukrainians are capable of finding humour in literally anything. This is one of our greatest strengths. It is precisely that survival mechanism developed by a society that for decades lived in a state of constant turbulence, danger and historical trauma, yet never allowed itself to sink fully into darkness and despair.

But behind all of this lies another thing we genuinely need to consider.

We are in fact witnessing an enormous tragedy. A tragedy not only of the war itself, not only of thousands of deaths and destroyed cities. But also the realisation that at one of the most terrible moments in our history, our country was governed by people who proved to be catastrophically incompetent, cynical and utterly detached from reality. Where state decisions were almost invariably made not on the basis of professionalism, strategic thinking and an understanding of the scale of the challenges, but out of chaos, whims, grievances, fears and media optics – driven by ego and the desire to live inside one's own political bubble.

And this is truly a terrifying realisation. Even for a single moment one cannot forget the conditions in which Ukraine existed throughout these years of full-scale invasion. Every day someone died. Every single day. At the front, in frontline cities and in the rear, under the rubble of buildings, in hospitals, in captivity, in their own flats after yet another Russian strike. Someone was losing their children, while someone else was permanently losing their home and their life.

Alongside this – and we are only now beginning to grasp it – a significant part of the state governance system in the country was not functioning, existing only in a formal capacity and occupied with something entirely different from what a state fighting for its own survival should have been occupied with.

We will also have to come to terms with one of the most painful truths of recent years: throughout this time, Ukraine survived not because of the state machine's effectiveness, but largely in spite of its weakness, chaos and at times outright degradation.

In many respects, Ukraine was held together by the horizontal ties of society. Volunteers. Mid-level officials. Military personnel. Doctors and teachers. Small and medium businesses. People who, without orders, without positions, without instructions, took responsibility simply because otherwise everything would have collapsed.

Ukraine was held together by people who pooled money for drones, sourced body armour, repaired vehicles for the front, evacuated strangers' children, opened their flats to displaced persons, raised millions for the Armed Forces, worked without days off and often without any faith in the fairness of the system – yet with faith in their own country.

And the most terrifying thing about the story of the Dynasty cooperative – and it is precisely this I want to return to, rather than the stories about Yermak's fortune-tellers – is not even the fact of corruption itself. The most terrifying thing is the scale of the moral blindness.

Because while some people were dying in the trenches near Bakhmut and Avdiivka, while others were raising money for tourniquets for their acquaintances among soldiers, while mothers waited for calls from the front and children spent nights in the metro during missile strikes – at that very same time, someone continued building themselves estates, absorbing budgets, drawing up schemes and profiting – off the state, the army and the chaos.

And no matter how hard anyone tries to talk over this problem with memes, jokes and the cover of information noise, the substance does not change: in the midst of a major war, what we are dealing with is not even corruption – it is outright looting.

That is precisely why the most important thing now is not simply to be outraged and move on, as has happened more than once in Ukrainian history, but to finally draw conclusions. Just because our country can no longer afford to live endlessly experimenting on itself.

Above all, professionalism must become a value once again. Intellect must become a value once again. Competence must cease to be an object of ridicule or something "boring" compared to charisma, spectacle, telegenic appeal or polished political imagery. We must stop being a country where Netflix has won.

And there is in fact someone to count on here. Over the course of recent historical upheavals, Ukraine has produced an entire generation of very capable people: officials, managers, diplomats, economists, anti-corruption practitioners, military personnel, technocrats, people with international experience – people who are genuinely capable of building institutions rather than merely speaking eloquently about change.

In my own circle there are dozens of such people who want to be of use to their country and are doing everything within their power in their current positions. They simply need to be given the ability to work!

A country at war is not a stage for endless political performance, nor a talent show.

The second critically important conclusion is that the inevitability of punishment must be established.

Because until we as a state demonstrate the capacity to deliver justice, the risk of unpleasant episodes repeating themselves will remain. And so the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine, and the Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office, and then the judicial system must finally do their job comprehensively. And above all – do it properly and without grandstanding. Not for the sake of revenge or political retribution, but for the sake of the most basic rehabilitation of the state.

If those implicated in corrupt acts escape accountability once again, the system will draw one single conclusion: this can continue. One can wait it out, or hide once more behind patriotic slogans, media campaigns or yet another set of political constructs.

And then everything will repeat in a cycle. With one difference only: our country is left with ever fewer internal resources not merely for development, but for survival itself.

Yet despite all the uncomfortable conclusions and events we are living through as a society, there is good news as well. This entire episode has shown one thing: Ukraine is not Russia.

This also is very important to remember, because when people took to the streets last July and protested against attempts to dismantle NABU and SAPO, society demonstrated once again that it is capable of intervening in its own history and changing its course. Even when someone temporarily vested with power and resources believes that everything has already been decided somewhere at the top, that they can bend two hundred MPs, deploy controlled law enforcement and deceive one's own people and European partners.

And that is precisely why not everything is lost.

Yes, Ukraine's democratic transformation has already stretched into almost the third decade of our lives, counting from the Orange Revolution of 2004. Yes, we are paying a very high price for the right to be a normal European state. Yes, we make mistakes, we are disappointed, we grow tired and at times we go round in circles.

But the history of Ukraine over the past 35 years since the restoration of our independence is the history of a society that constantly falls, yet constantly rises back to its feet. That finds within itself the strength to keep believing in this country, no matter what.

A few days ago, a European official asked me what Western partners should do when observing the latest corruption scandal, in which the country's top political leadership is clearly implicated. Who can be relied upon in this situation, and whether we are fully confident that the manageability of the system can be maintained.

I had only one answer: do not betray, do not turn away – support, in this situation, the Ukrainian people who with their last strength believe that this country will prevail. Who have made their historic choice and remain true to it, despite the excessively high price.

Even after the most terrible mistakes, losses and disappointments, we will be able to rise and continue forging this difficult path.

Sevğil Musaieva