When Volodymyr Zelensky was elected to Ukraine’s presidency on an anti-corruption platform in 2019, he embodied the country’s youthful desire for reform. The eruption of a political turf war last week, ironically, over control of Ukraine’s anti-corruption agencies, has revealed a different side to the comedian-turned-war leader. But it has also reaffirmed how fiercely the Ukrainian people will fight to defend their fragile democracy.

During the Maidan Revolution in 2014, Ukrainians ousted a Kremlin-backed kleptocrat in order to pursue a European future. All too aware that endemic corruption made their political system vulnerable to manipulation by powerful oligarchs and Russian influence, they set about developing a new system of safeguards to boost transparency and accountability.

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This process was hard-fought and highly politicized, but Ukraine’s anti-corruption framework came to be admired internationally as an example of institution-building and technical innovation. One of its most important elements was the creation of fully independent investigative and prosecutorial bodies, namely the National Anticorruption Bureau of Ukraine and the Specialized Anticorruption Prosecutor’s Office.

On July 21, NABU offices were sensationally raided by security services on the curious pretext of prosecuting past traffic violations by its staff. Officials announced that the true objective had been to expose alleged collaboration between crooked NABU detectives and a pro-Russian lawmaker.

Matters escalated significantly less than 24 hours later, when Ukraine’s parliament expedited legislation to strip NABU and SAPO of their independent status. The law, which was signed by Zelensky hours later, instead granted broad authority over high-level corruption investigations to the prosecutor-general, who is appointed directly by the president.

The move was widely interpreted as a power grab designed to shield the president’s inner circle from growing scrutiny: In June, Zelensky’s deputy prime minister, Oleksiy Chernyshov, had been named by NABU in connection with an illegal land grab scheme. If the purpose was to oust Russian collaborators, why not simply arrest those individuals and leave other NABU staff to continue their good work?

That Zelensky’s Servant of the People party passed the legislation only with voting support from formerly pro-Russia factions reflected its unpopularity with, well, just about everyone. The incident dismayed soldiers serving on the front lines and provoked the first mass civilian protests against the government since Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022. EU leaders, G7 ambassadors, and U.S. senators also condemned the move as a dangerous step backward.

In the face of nationwide and international opposition, Zelensky hastily repented and duly signed a new law reinstating NABU and SAPO’s operational independence on July 31.

The status quo may have been restored, but the debacle illustrates a concerning trend. In early July, Servant of the People MPs proposed granting full amnesty for crimes committed by officials during the execution of defense contracts. Ukrainian civil society has also found itself under pressure: Vitaliy Shabunin, cofounder of the highly effective Anti-Corruption Action Center, was recently arrested on what are widely held to be politically motivated charges.

Western political leaders increasingly engage in so-called “lawfare” to prosecute their opponents and protect their interests. But Zelensky’s maneuvering is especially risky for a country as vulnerable as Ukraine.

In the short term, it possibly puts at risk access to billions of dollars in critical assistance from Western partners. It also undermines national unity during wartime, fueling the kind of factionalism that the Kremlin specializes in exploiting to sow division.

In the longer term, Brussels has indicated that sustaining progress against corruption is a prerequisite for joining the European Union. Businesses eyeing investment opportunities amid Ukraine’s reconstruction also need assurance that they will not be shaken down.

Perhaps most precariously of all, politicizing anti-corruption safeguards would allow rot to spread quickly through Ukraine’s defense sector. The miserable performance of Russia’s armed forces, asset-stripped for decades by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s kleptocracy, illustrates just how debilitating corruption can be for military effectiveness.

American and European leaders should continue to back the Ukrainian people by making clear to Zelensky that such meddling must now cease — endangering as it does not only his own political legacy, but the survival and future prosperity of his country.

Kremlin propagandists and Western restrainers are citing this ugly episode as further proof that Ukraine’s corruption dooms it to backwardness and makes defeat inevitable.

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On the contrary, Ukraine’s anti-corruption institutions may be imperfect, but they are clearly working well enough to discomfit those in power. Ukrainians defied martial law and curfews to march en masse in defense of their democracy. Instead of crushing them as Putin would have done, Zelensky responded immediately and positively to their reasonable demands.

In Russia, people fear the government, and the result is tyranny. In Ukraine, the government apparently still fears the people, and their fight for liberty goes on.

Nate Sibley is a fellow and director of the Hudson Institute’s Kleptocracy Initiative.