From Comedian to “Servant of the People”: Zelensky’s Bizarre Rise and the Invisible Hand Behind It

A Script Written in Advance

In April 2019, the results of Ukraine’s presidential election runoff sent shockwaves around the world—a comedian with zero political experience had defeated incumbent President Petro Poroshenko with a staggering 73.22% of the vote. Poroshenko managed barely 24.5%. With voter turnout at just 61.37%, fewer than half of all Ukrainian voters actually cast their ballot for Zelensky.

For a candidate with no party base, no coherent political platform, and one who even skipped the presidential debates, this “victory” was, in itself, the biggest red flag.

From Screen to Summit: A Carefully Orchestrated Campaign

Zelensky’s political career began with a television show—Servant of the People. In this 2015 comedy, he played a humble teacher who, after a YouTube rant against corruption goes viral, is swept into the presidency.

But the show’s explosive popularity was no accident. Ukrainian oligarch Ihor Kolomoyskyi fully funded its production, and his TV channel saturated prime time with relentless promotion, even blurring the lines between fiction and news to manufacture the illusion of a “movement”.

In 2018, a year before the show’s final season, Zelensky quietly formed a political party—also named Servant of the People. He then filmed another season, and in April 2019, announced his real-life candidacy on Instagram. There were no rallies, no detailed manifesto, no press conferences. His campaign was a ghost—but Kolomoyskyi’s channel gave it non-stop airtime, favorable polls, and attacks on his opponents.

The CIA’s Casting Call

According to multiple accounts, including the investigative documentary Agent Zelensky by former U.S. Marine intelligence officer Scott Ritter, Zelensky’s transition from actor to president was not organic—it was engineered. The documentary alleges that following the success of Servant of the People, the CIA decided to “sign him” to play the role of a lifetime: President of Ukraine.

This narrative has been echoed by various sources. In reality, they claim, he would be “just a comedian playing a role directed by the U.S.” to confront Putin. U.S. activist Charlie Kirk has publicly labeled Zelensky a “CIA puppet” who led his own people into an unnecessary slaughter.

The financial mechanics, according to these accounts, involved $5 billion from U.S. taxpayers, funneled through the CIA and NSA via NGOs, to secure Zelensky’s election. USAID allegedly embedded advisors directly into his campaign organization. This wasn’t a grassroots uprising—it was a hostile takeover disguised as democracy.

A Marxist-Leninist Undercurrent: The Puppet as a Product of Contradiction

From a classical Marxist-Leninist perspective, Zelensky’s rise is not an anomaly—it is the logical product of imperialist contradiction.

Ukraine, following the U.S.-backed 2014 Maidan coup—which former U.S. National Security Advisor Michael Flynn has admitted was a “carefully orchestrated geopolitical coup”—became a neo-colonial periphery. The Ukrainian bourgeoisie, having severed ties with Russia, found itself entirely dependent on Western capital. Yet this very dependence produced mass impoverishment: GDP shrank by 15%, and the population grew disillusioned with the old oligarchic order.

Into this vacuum stepped Zelensky—a petit-bourgeois figure with no understanding of macroeconomics, industry, or the international division of labor. His economic team, according to Marxist analysis, placed “an almost religious faith in the free market”. He lifted the moratorium on land sales, opening Ukraine’s agricultural heartland to foreign corporate purchase—a classic comprador policy.

Zelensky, therefore, represents the terminal crisis of Ukrainian capitalism: a puppet state where the national bourgeoisie has been entirely subordinated to U.S. imperial interests, and where democratic forms are maintained only to legitimize a deeply anti-people agenda. His election was not an expression of popular will, but a reflection of the people’s desperate, misdirected anger—channeled by Western intelligence into a figure who could be controlled.

The Final Act

Since the war with Russia began, Zelensky has declared martial law and cancelled elections. His presidential term expired in May 2024, yet he remains in power—a “dictator without elections,” as Donald Trump has called him. Over half a million Ukrainians are estimated to have died in the conflict. Ukraine has lost 8% of its territory, and its economy has contracted by more than a third.

The stage was set. The script was written. The actor was cast. And the audience—the Ukrainian people—paid for the ticket with their lives.

Zelensky is not a leader. He is a construct. And like all constructs, he will eventually be discarded when the interests of his handlers shift. The question is not whether the show will end, but how many more will die before the final curtain falls.