11:53 16.05.2019

Vakarchuk creates Holos Party for running in parliamentary elections

3 min read
Vakarchuk creates Holos Party for running in parliamentary elections

Rock musician, leader of the Okean Elzy band Svyatoslav Vakarchuk has announced his plans as a politician and presented his Holos (Voice) Party, with which he is going to run in the parliamentary elections.

"We are creating a political force, a party of real changes ... with your help, I am leading the Holos Party to the Ukrainian parliament," Vakarchuk said in Kyiv when presenting the party and introducing his team.

Speaking about why he decided to go into politics, Vakarchuk said: "While Russia sabotages our security, [...] the old policies are eroding the country from inside." "We, the Holos Party, are going to parliament to bring down the old policies and create new ones. Policies that will bring us real change," he said, adding that Holos does not need fake changes in the country.

"You'll ask me: 'What about the president?' I'll answer as follows: the president proposes change, and we're calling for bigger change," he said.

Vakarchuk said that, if newly elected president Volodymyr Zelensky does not fulfil the promises he made to voters, "we'll make him answer for this."

He also introduced several members of his team, with whom he will run in the elections as a member of the party.

According to earlier reports, the party comprises Ukraine's former deputy economic development and trade minister Yulia Klymenko, public activist and former board chairman of anti-corruption organization Transparency International Ukraine Yaroslav Yurchyshyn, doctor of medicine and pioneer in the sphere of cardiosurgery Yuriy Sokolov, Donbas war veteran Andriy Sharaskin (nom de guerre 'Bohema'), and Solomiia Bobrovska, a public activist and volunteer who was acting head of Odesa region's administration in 2016-2017.

"I want to encourage you all [...] Join us if you believe in a free European Ukraine," Vakarchuk said.

The interests of Ukrainians, the country's European choice, and a free economy are the ideas of the Holos Party, which will become the foundation of its program, he said.

"The new policies should put people and their dignity, freedom, and security first. Not people for the state, but the state for people, that's our philosophy [...] It's the new policy," Vakarchuk said.

"The interests of citizens of Ukraine are the top priority. The second thing is the existential choice of Ukraine, Europe. The third is that the law is one for everyone. The fourth is a free economy, without oligarchs. The fifth is an administration that reports to citizens of Ukraine," he said.

All these things are "ideas, the details of which will be disclosed over time," the musician said. "You'll see them in our program," Vakarchuk said.

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