Zelenskiy, 41, is an actor and stand-up comedian and one of the most popular actors in Ukraine. In his show Servant of the People, in which he played a school teacher, he woke up to find that his rant at corrupt politicians had spread and put him on the presidential throne.
Early life and career as an entertainer
Zelenskiy was born in the industrial metropolis of Krivlikh in southern Ukraine to Jewish parents. When he was a child, his family moved to Erdente, Mongolia, and four years later returned to Krivelich, where Zelenskiy was studying. Like many people from the Dnipropetrovsk region of Ukraine, he grew up speaking Russian as his native language, but he was also fluent in Ukrainian and English. In 1995, he entered the Kryvyy Rih Faculty of Economics on the local campus of Kiev State University of Economics and received his law degree in 2000.
Although Zelenskiy was licensed to practice law, his career has moved in a different direction. When he was a student, he was active in theater, which would become his main focus. In 1997, his performance group Kvartal 95 ("Quarter 95", a community in central Kryvy Rih where Zelensky spent his childhood), appeared in the final of the television broadcast of KVN (Klub vesyólykh i nakhódchivykh; "Club of Funny and Creative People"), a popular improv comedy competition , broadcast in the CIS countries. Zelensky and Kvartal 95 became regulars on KVN until 2003, when they appeared on the show. That year, Zelenskiy co-founded Studio Kvartal 95, a production company that went on to become one of the most successful and prolific entertainment studios in Ukraine. Zelensky will serve as artistic director of Studio Kvartal 95, and from the company's inception until 2011, he was appointed chief producer of the Ukrainian TV channel Inter TV.
With Ukraine's economy stagnating and Poroshenko's approval rating approaching single digits, the 2019 presidential election seems likely to repeat the 2014 campaign, with the incumbent president facing Orange Revolution veteran Yulia Tymoshenko. Instead, more than three dozen candidates competed, and Zelensky became one of the front-runners almost from the moment he announced his candidacy. The announcement was issued on December 31, 2018 on 1+1, preempting Poroshenko's annual New Year's address. The provocative move raised questions about 1+1 owner Kolomoisky's involvement in Zelensky's campaign. Kolomoisky, a staunch ally of Poroshenko, has lived in self-exile since June 2017, when Poroshenko nationalized PrivatBank, a financial institution co-founded by Kolomoisky. Kolomoisky was accused of stealing billions of dollars from PrivatBank, Ukraine's largest bank, and the Ukrainian government was forced to inject more than $5.6 billion into the "too big to fail" company to keep it alive.
Zelenskiy took steps to distance himself from Kolomoiski, and his unorthodox campaign strategy simplified the task. He eschewed detailed policy statements and press conferences in favor of short speeches or comedy routines on YouTube and Instagram. On March 31, 2019, Zelenskiy won more than 30 percent of the vote in the first round of the presidential election, with Poroshenko leading the way with 16 percent. Two days before the start of the second round of voting, Zelenskiy refused to debate Poroshenko, a meeting that had all the hallmarks of a sporting event. Thousands of people gathered at kiev's Olympic Stadium on April 19, 2019 to witness the standoff, despite Poroshenko's attempts to portray Zelenskiy as a man who lacked the courage to face the Russian president. Vladimir Putin, who failed to deal any major blow to his opponents. The second debate was scheduled to take place later in the evening, but Zelenskiy was not present and said "one day of debate is enough".