Volodymyr Zelenskyy ordered the dismissal of Serhii Shefir from the post of first assistant to the President of Ukraine, which he had held since May 2019.
The decree about this appeared on the official website of the president on March 30.
Serhii Shefir was considered one of the closest confidants in the circle of close advisers of President Zelensky, being a personal friend since his youth and staying at "Kvartal-95 Studio".
Currently, the official reasons for this step of the president remain unknown.
In recent days, President Zelenskyi has made significant changes in his environment. People who joined the government together with him back in 2019 were released.
On March 26, a decree was published on the dismissal of the Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council Oleksiy Danilov. His place was taken by the former head of the Foreign Intelligence Service Oleksandr Lytvynenko.
On Friday evening, two deputy heads of the Office of the President Andrii Yermak - Oleksiy Dniprov and Andrii Smirnov - were also dismissed. Elena Kovalska and Iryna Mudra, who are considered close to Andriy Yermak, were appointed to their places.
Serhii Shefir became the next on this list.
According to journalists, this decision may also be related to the influence of the head of the President's Office. Despite the fact that after the assassination attempt on Serhiy Shefir in 2021, he actually withdrew from active participation in affairs and lost trust in contacts, in particular with oligarchs.
Serhii Shefir, who is 59 years old, has a rich shared history with Volodymyr Zelenskyi, both were born in Kryvyi Rih. In the 1990s, together with their older brother Boris, they wrote jokes for various KVN teams, including the "95th quarter", which became the favorite team of the future president of Ukraine.
It is believed that it was Serhiy and Boris Shefiry who invited Zelensky to the KVN Zaporizhzhia - Kryvyi Rih - Transit team, which later won the highest Russian KVN league.
Later, Serhii Shefir developed into a film producer and screenwriter.
According to the publication "theBabel", in 2019, the Shefiry brothers and Volodymyr Zelenskyi lived together in Moscow.
Volodymyr Zelensky's declaration for 2023 states that he is a co-owner of an apartment in Kyiv together with Serhiy Shefir and his brother, and Shefir's wife is a co-owner of a non-residential premises together with Olena Zelenska.
After returning to Ukraine, Zelenskyi and Shefir founded the Kvartal 95 studio, which became a significant business. Shefir is considered one of the key people in Zelenskyi's circle, and it was to him that the president transferred his share in Kvartal.
Although Serhii Shefir was considered as one of the possible candidates for the position of the head of the presidential administration, he himself noted that a "well-versed legal person" should be appointed to this position.
In the president's office, Shefir had contacts with large businesses in Ukraine and abroad, focusing on investors who invest money and receive dividends.
