Shabunin issues first statement after SBI raids, accuses Zelenskyy of turning toward corrupt authoritarianism

Using the war as cover, Volodymyr Zelenskyy is taking his first — but confident — steps toward corrupt authoritarianism.

Take, for example, the bill by 123 of his “Servants” to amnesty corruption in arms procurement.
Although society managed to strike down this particular bill, Zelenskyy is already preparing a new one — this time under the auspices of the SBU and the Prosecutor General’s Office, albeit for a slightly narrower circle of “his people.”

Or another example: the very public non-appointment of the competition winner as director of the Bureau of Economic Security. Zelenskyy’s Cabinet, openly and brazenly, violated a clear and direct provision of the law.
To the “Servants,” the word of their tsar outweighs Article 19 of the Constitution, which says that government bodies may act only within the limits and in the manner prescribed by law.

No doubt smaller, but still a step toward Zelenskyy’s corrupt authoritarianism, are the criminal cases against me and other critics or whistleblowers.
To chase. To intimidate. To use a few examples to show everyone that, if he wants to, he can do whatever he wants, to whomever he wants.

A warrantless search of the unit’s permanent deployment site — the one I had joined just a day earlier — began at 14:00 p.m. on July 11 and lasted until 5 a.m. on July 12.
In the middle of the search, I was served with a notice of suspicion. Zelenskyy’s modern-day oprychniks at the State Bureau of Investigation and Prosecutor’s Office now want to imprison me for 5 to 10 years for receiving an official salary of 225,000 hryvnias over six months — 40,000 of which went straight to taxes and fees.

One specific goal of this 15-hour performance was to tamper with my phone.
As soon as the SBI investigation team burst into the room, an SBU officer ran out with my phone in hand.
Two hours later, someone outside yelled: “Hey, there’s a phone lying under the doorstep!” And an SBI agent walked into the room holding an unlocked phone.
All of this is on the investigators’ own video.

So now I await the fantastical tales from Zelenskyy’s media entourage.
Procedurally, I have no idea how they plan to legalize this circus (even in Pechersk Court).

A detailed breakdown of the suspicion notice and the illegal actions of Zelenskyy’s oprychniks in the SBI and Prosecutor’s Office is available at the link in the comments.

I feel terribly sorry for my wife and kids, who returned to Ukraine from the U.S. in spring 2023 (I’ll write more about this later).
I’m proud of the Anticorruption Center team, who stayed remarkably calm and collected. They even managed to organize lawyers for me all the way from Chuhuiv in the middle of the night.

I’m also sincerely grateful for the support of so many incredible people.
Especially those who say, “I don’t support Shabunin, but…” We may have different views, but we all can smell the stench of corrupt authoritarianism just as clearly.