Ukraine's military has higher approval ratings than President Zelensky
(Baonghean.vn) - The most recent survey organized with US support shows that in Ukraine, the army is more popular than the president.
RT quoted a survey commissioned by the International Republican Institute (IRI) and funded by USAID as saying that Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky is facing a serious decline in his approval rating.
Specifically, the poll released this week shows that only 42% of Ukrainians “strongly support” their president, while 40% “somewhat support.” Those figures were up from 58% and 33%, respectively, in the poll conducted in April.
Partial and strong disapproval of Zelensky increased from 4 and 3% in April to 9 and 7% in September, respectively.
With a high approval rating of 82%, the Ukrainian military is more popular than the president, although that is down from 89% in April.
The next most popular politician in Kiev is Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba, with a high approval rating of 30% – down from 44% in April – and 41% partial approval, up from 32% previously. However, Mr Kuleba's disapproval rating has doubled to 16%.
Prime Minister Denis Shmigal has just 10% approval and a total disapproval rating of 42%. Ukraine's parliament, the Verkhovna Rada, does even worse; only 5% strongly approve of its job, while 67% somewhat or strongly disapprove.
Some 94% of Ukrainians still believe their country would win a conflict with Russia, although this is down from 97% in April 2022. Only 68% believe Kiev would regain all of the territory it claims – the “1991 borders”, meaning all the regions that voted to join Russia, including Crimea.
The survey was conducted by the Rating polling agency on behalf of the IRI Center for Survey Research. It was based on a representative sample of 2,000 Ukrainian adults and was funded by USAID.
Meanwhile, an Economist/YouGov poll released on October 25 found that Mr. Zelensky is more popular among Americans than either President Joe Biden or his predecessor and likely 2024 opponent, Donald Trump. Half of Americans surveyed rated the Ukrainian leader positively and 24% unfavorably. Trump and Biden each received only 42% approval, while 55% disliked the current US president and 54% disliked his predecessor.
