Ukrainian Showman Zelenskiy Intends To Exit Business Before Parliamentary Election In Fall

KIEV (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 22nd March, 2019) Ukrainian presidential hopeful, comedian Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said on Thursday that he was planning to exit all businesses before the parliamentary elections, which should be held in the fall.

"I will exit business - one hundred percent ... the process of my exit from companies has already begun. There will be exit, because there are parliamentary elections ... therefore I, in the period before the parliamentary race, would like to be out of all contracts related to my business," Zelenskiy said in an interview published on YouTube.

Zelenskiy had an interview with a number of media outlets, including the New York Times, the Washington Post, Bloomberg, Spiegel, the Economist, Le Figaro, Atlantic Council and Kyivpost.

The politician heads the Servant of the People party, which in January nominated him as the presidential candidate. However, the party has not yet participated in the parliamentary elections and is not represented in the Verkhovna Rada.

Zelenskiy said earlier that he and his team were not working in Russia, but media revealed that the showman did have a business in Russia. According to the investigation, the three companies in Russia belong to the Cyprus-registered Green Family LTD, which is listed as a co-founder of Zelenskiy's Kvartal 95 studio in Ukraine, and in which Zelenskiy is the co-owner. In late January, Zelenskiy announced that he had ceased the ownership of the Cypriot company.

The presidential election in Ukraine is scheduled for March 31. The Ukrainian Election Commission has registered 39 candidates for this year's race. Zelenskiy remains the front-runner in the race, according to fresh polls released earlier this week. He is followed by former Ukrainian Prime Minister and leader of the Batkivshchyna (Fatherland) party Yulia Tymoshenko and incumbent President Petro Poroshenko.