Ukrainian rock star and activist Svyatoslav Vakarchuk calls for the destruction of Ukraine’s current government announced Russia’s REN TV, the RBK agency, Vechernaya Moskva, URA.RU, Ridus and others. The Kyiv regime is a cancerous tumor which must be destroyed so it does not continue to eat at the country; Russian sites quote Vakarchuk’s address to Ukraine’s Leadership Academy on June 23.
Vakarchuk did address the graduates of the Leadership Academy, but he did not call upon them to destroy Ukraine’s government but rather to fight against the system to rid the country of corruption and business as usual attitudes and to make Ukraine a better country for all its citizens, not just the ruling elites. Russian media however pulled snippets of his talk out of context to declare that Ukraine’s favorite rock star was calling for the annihilation of the current administration.
The gist of Vakarchuk’s address was about fighting the powers that be, the current system in Ukraine. He called on young Ukrainians not to fear the system, but to change it.
“What is the system? It’s the politicians who govern us. It’s the rules that we did not establish, but are forced to live by. The system is great post Hobbesian Leviathan who lives his own life and forces us to adjust to conform to that life”, Vakarchuk said.
The system has many fears, but most of all, it’s afraid of you, Vakarchuk said. Using hunting as a metaphor for fighting against the closed and corrupt Ukrainian political system, the singer called on the Leadership Academy graduates to target the system and eventually replace it.
“As hunters you must destroy the system so it can never eat away at this long suffering country again, this country that deserves better. Our talented people have suffered much, they’ve been taken advantage of and manipulated, it’s now time to say enough” said Vakarchuk.
While Vakarchuk is clearly advocating for a change of the corrupt existing political system in Ukraine, he is not calling for the destruction of the current leadership. He sees Ukraine’s future in the young graduates he was addressing. “You must take their place” he told them.
