Vyacheslav Kirilenko

Date of Birth: 07.06.1968

Place of Birth. Education. Born in the settlement of Poleskoye in the Kyiv region. Graduated from the Faculty of Philosophy of Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv in 1993, completed postgraduate studies in 1996. Doctor of Philosophy.

Social and Political Engagement. From 1992 to 1993, Kirilenko headed the Ukrainian Student Union. In 1993, he became a member of the People's Movement of Ukraine and later a member of the presidium of the Central Committee of the NRU. Concurrently (from 1993 to 2002), he led the Ukrainian youth organization Young Movement. In 2001, he was a member of the presidium of the Civic Committee 'For the Truth!', and deputy chairman of the youth coalition Our Ukraine. In 2002, he became deputy chairman of the Ukrainian People's Party.

Kirilenko was a member of the Ukrainian Parliament five times. From 1998 to 2002, he was part of the faction of the Ukrainian People's Movement and served as secretary of the parliamentary committee on social policy and labor. From 2002 to 2005, he was a member of the Our Ukraine faction and the first deputy chairman of the same committee in Parliament.

Kirilenko was an active participant in two political actions of civil disobedience - the 'Revolution on Granite' (student hunger strike of 1990 that accelerated Ukraine's independence) and the 'Orange Revolution' of 2004.

On February 4, 2005, after Viktor Yushchenko's electoral victory in the presidential elections in Ukraine, Kirilenko was appointed as the Minister of Labor and Social Policy in the first 'orange' government (Yulia Tymoshenko). On September 27 of the same year, following Lady Yu's government resignation, he became Deputy Prime Minister for Humanitarian Affairs and Social Policy in the government of Yuriy Yekhanurov.

In the 2006 parliamentary elections, Kirilenko was elected for the third time as an independent to the Ukrainian Parliament - on the list of the Our Ukraine bloc. After the formation of Viktor Yanukovych's Regional Government in August of the same year, he immediately switched from the cabinet to the parliament. On December 13, 2006, Kirilenko became a member of the party People's Union Our Ukraine (NSNU) and twelve days later was elected as head of the Our Ukraine faction in parliament. He replaced Roman Bessmertny in this position, who decided to focus more on the reform of the NSNU and later became the deputy head of the secretariat of President Viktor Baloha. On March 31, Kirilenko was elected party chairman at the NSNU congress.

In the early parliamentary elections in September 2007, Kirilenko entered the Verkhovna Rada under number 2 on the electoral list of the Our Ukraine - National Security bloc. He led the NUNS faction. After the faction split into wings for Yuriy Prokhorov and against Yulia Tymoshenko, Kirilenko made way for Mykola Martynenko.

In 2008, he had to leave the NSNU party chairmanship to its honorary president Yushchenko. In December of the same year, he resigned in protest against the formation of the NSNU - BYuT - Lytvyn bloc coalition from his position as chairman of the NUNS. He soon founded the deputy group For Ukraine! Later, he headed the For Ukraine! party.

Since December 2012, he has been a member of the Ukrainian Parliament of the VII Convocation, having come in 6th place on the Batkivshchyna party list. He is deputy head of the People's Front faction. Chairman of the Committee on Culture and Spirituality of Parliament. Not affiliated with any party.

At the first party congress in September 2014 of the political party People's Community (founded by Ukraine's Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk and Parliament Speaker Alexander Turchinov after they left the Batkivshchyna party), there was a merger with the For Ukraine! party. It was also decided not to include former members of the Party of Regions in the party lists. Politician Vyacheslav Kirilenko was included in the political council of the new party.

In the parliamentary elections on October 26, 2014, the party took the first place. Vyacheslav Kirilenko took the 8th place on the party list.

He represented the People's Front together with Sergey Pashinsky and Pavel Pinsenik in negotiations to form a coalition in parliament with the Petro Poroshenko Bloc and Samopomich parties. On November 3, Kirilenko announced that 'by the end of the week, the text of the agreement would be 90% ready.'

On December 2, 2014, the Verkhovna Rada voted for the new government of Ukraine, in which Kirilenko was appointed Deputy Prime Minister - Minister of Culture.

From April 14, 2016, to August 29, 2019, he served as Deputy Prime Minister of Ukraine.

He participated in the early parliamentary elections of 2019 as a candidate of the European Solidarity party, taking 38th place on the party list but failed to enter parliament.

Views. Immediately after his election as the faction leader in parliament in 2006, Kirilenko stated that Our Ukraine would continue to be the most democratic, open, and active party in the parliament in the fight for democratic values, Eurointegration, and Ukraine's accession to NATO. Incidentally, Kirilenko stated in the summer of 2006, due to disagreements over values, that he would not be willing under any circumstances to work in Yanukovych's government. The coalition format that he and his faction wanted to see was Our Ukraine - BYuT - SPQ. Nevertheless, Kirilenko expressed the opinion in October 2006 that a broad coalition (Party of Regions - SPQ - KPU - Our Ukraine) could be formed. However, only if the presidential universal national unity in the Verkhovna Rada is voted on by name, will it be much more inconvenient for the subjects of this created majority complex to ignore the adopted document.

According to his own statements, Kirilenko was a staunch opponent of the 2004 political reform and advocated revisiting the constitutional reforms that limited the powers of the President of Ukraine while simultaneously strengthening the role of Parliament and the Government. In the spring of 2007, he actively supported the idea of forming a united parliamentary opposition (in the form of NU and BYuT) and supporting Yushchenko's initiative to prematurely terminate the powers of the Verkhovna Rada V. and call for new elections.

After the early parliamentary elections, Kirilenko was one of those on whom Yushchenko relied when initiating the formation of a megablock aimed at transforming the NU into a single pro-presidential party. However, this project failed for a number of reasons - both ideological and related to the personal ambitions of the politicians.

Family. The politician is married. His wife, Ekaterina, is an associate professor at the Department of Philosophy at the National University of Culture and Arts Kyiv. The couple raise a daughter (in autumn 2006, the girl entered first grade) and a son (born in 2009).

Hobbies. Kirilenko's hobbies include philosophy, literature, and football.

07.06.2022