Kyiv, Ukraine – With her trademark crown braid, Yulia Tymoshenko was the Orange Revolution’s poster girl. In 2004, mass pro-Western protests overturned what the demonstrators said was the fraudulent election of Viktor Yanukovych, a Moscow-friendly presidential candidate – and made Tymoshenko Ukraine’s first female prime minister.Recommended Stories list of 4 itemsend of listBut “scandal” is the word mostly associated with Tymoshenko’s subsequent political trajectory along with a recent ideological tilt towards neo-conservative nationalism that largely resonates with United States President Donald Trump’s rhetoric.Despite her chameleon-like populism, Tymoshenko, a prominent opposition politician, sank in the polls and unsuccessfully ran for president three times, including in 2019 when Ukrainians voted in Volodymyr Zelenskyy, a comedian with zero political experience.Last week, Tymoshenko called Zelenskyy a “narrow-minded dictator” and accused him of orchestrating corruption charges against her to bar her from taking part in a new presidential race.Observers have told Al Jazeera that her dismal approval ratings mean she is not a rival to Zelenskyy while her rift with the president may weaken wartime decision-making and her obstruction of new cabinet appointments constitutes an “outrageous crime”.Anticorruption investigators who charged Tymoshenko on Wednesday with “buying” lawmakers’ votes have proved their independence from Zelenskyy by going after his closest allies and lawmakers from his Servant of the People party.Investigators searched the office of Tymoshenko’s Motherland party for 12 hours and published a recording of Tymoshenko talking to a Servant of the People lawmaker discussing bribes of $10,000 per vote. Advertisement “If we agree with you today …
