Zelenskyy met with security chiefs and top officials before Yermak stepped down as head of office

Before making the decision that Andrii Yermak would step down as head of the President's Office, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy met with Deputy Prime Minister Mykhailo Fedorov, the head of the Security Service (SSU), the director of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) and the head of the Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office (SAPO).

Source: Ukrainska Pravda article Ali Baba and the Forty Statesmen: How Andrii Yermak lost his position as the president's right-hand man and avoided charges

Details: Deputy Prime Minister Mykhailo Fedorov, SSU Head Vasyl Maliuk, NABU Director Semen Kryvonos and SAPO Head Oleksandr Klymenko arrived at the President's Office at 09:00.

According to Ukrainska Pravda sources, this was at least the third such meeting in the past two weeks since the start of Mindichgate. But this time the heads of the anti-corruption agencies were accompanied, as negotiators, by Maliuk and Fedorov.

Zelenskyy's team were looking for an option in which the active phase of the searches targeting the head of the President's Office would not be interpreted by Ukraine's international partners as a sign of chaos.

There had also been signals from within the government indicating that Yermak would have to step down.

Ukrainska Pravda sources say several key figures had made this clear over the previous two weeks: Fedorov; Speaker Ruslan Stefanchuk; Defence Minister Denys Shmyhal; and even Yermak's former associate Oleh Tatarov, to whom Ali Baba (one of Yermak's codenames) had also "assigned tasks" related to anti-corruption officials.

After an hour of discussion in Zelenskyy's office, the heads of NABU and SAPO left the government quarter without serving Yermak with a notice of suspicion. The president then took time to reflect on the situation.

There was no contact with Yermak at that time.

Finally, after several hours, the president made the final decision to let Yermak go and summoned Mykhailo Fedorov to help put together a video address in which the resignation of the head of the President's Office would be announced.

"What tipped the scales was that this could not be avoided, and that absolutely everyone supported it: MPs, law enforcement, the public, and key international partners," one person involved in the process said. "It was a state-oriented decision: the country needed to reboot multiple key institutions and critical processes."

Ukraine's US partners would probably agree. Ukrainska Pravda has learned that for the past six months, the Americans had been trying and failing to get across to Zelenskyy that Yermak should be replaced as the chief negotiator.

Background:

• Ukrainska Pravda has learned that a week before he stepped down, Andrii Yermak wanted to secure the resignation of Vasyl Maliuk, supposedly because Maliuk had "let Operation Midas happen" and failed to protect him.
• On 28 November, Ukrainska Pravda reported that officers from NABU and SAPO were conducting searches at Yermak's office in the government district. Ukrainska Pravda journalists managed to record around 10 officers from NABU and SAPO entering the government district.
• Yermak confirmed that a search was taking place at his home and said he was ready to assist the investigation. According to UP, he had not been served with a notice of suspicion as of that morning.
• Zelenskyy later announced that he had accepted Yermak's resignation as head of the Office of the President of Ukraine and that the institution would now undergo a reboot. The president said he would hold consultations with potential candidates on Saturday.
• Yermak subsequently announced that he was joining the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

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