‘I’ll never leave my country’: Zelenskyy says whether he will run for second term

The Ukrainian leader said this in an interview with the Portuguese edition of RTP.

2024 should be the year of elections, but, according to Zelenskyy, the Constitution does not provide for them to be held under martial law.

"Legally, we do not have the right to hold elections now," he emphasizes, but says he is "ready to make changes to the legislation".

"In 2024, if the war continues, and if the elections take place, I will never leave my country in my life," the president said.

When asked about the fear of losing the election, Zelenskyy said: "I am not afraid of anything."

Elections during the war

In May, the President of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, Tiny Kox, stated that it was necessary to hold free and fair elections in Ukraine despite the war. 

The Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine, Danilov, responded categorically: "There can be no elections, including presidential and parliamentary, in Ukraine during martial law."

On July 28, the Speaker of the Verkhovna Rada, Ruslan Stefanchuk, said that the Constitution of Ukraine does not prohibit holding elections during martial law, but that a balance must be held.

At the same time, US Senator Lindsey Graham of the Republican Party said that elections should be held in Ukraine in 2024 despite the martial law due to Russia's large-scale invasion.

Before Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022, 62.5% of citizens did not support the idea of Zelenskyy running for a second term in the 2024 elections.