Susanna Reid and Richard Madeley have expressed their staunch admiration for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky after his historic address to Parliament, dubbing him the ‘hero of the moment’.
On Tuesday afternoon, the comedian-turned-politician appeared in the House of Commons via video link as he delivered a speech to MPs about Ukraine’s war against Russia following Vladimir Putin’s attack on his nation.
Zelensky likened his country’s struggle to Britain’s experience battling Nazism during the Second World War, with many believing that he channelled wartime leader Winston Churchill with his stirring words.
On Wednesday morning, Susanna and Richard opened Good Morning Britain on ITV by talking about the address, as Richard remarked: ‘You just have this feeling that history’s being made here.’
‘What an extraordinary man this guy is, and what a clever speech. What a clever way to channel Shakespeare and then to channel Churchill, I mean really… this is a comedian! And he is a top-drawer politician. He knows his stuff,’ he said.
Susanna explained that Zelensky chose to go into entertainment after doing a law degree, before joining a political comedy group.
‘He then of course took part in that television show Servant of the People. He played a teacher who did a rant about corruption in the government, and it was so popular that he thought to himself, “I tell you what, maybe I just run for President!” Runs for President, and gets 73% of the vote, and here we are now,’ she stated.
‘He addressed Parliament yesterday afternoon, you could see MPs absolutely packed the chamber in the House of Commons and at the end of the speech, every single one of them on their feet giving applause.
‘If you didn’t see the speech, we do have a little bit of it now, and as Richard said, he knew his audience, he invoked the spirit of one of our wartime leaders, Winston Churchill.’
Richard shared that he finds it ‘wonderful when you see a human being rise to the occasion’, remarking that ‘you don’t see it very often in politics anywhere’.
‘But when you see it, it’s authentic, and it lifts the heart, doesn’t it? You see somebody who’s actually grasped the moment, understands what’s necessary and delivered,’ he added.
‘He’s the hero that they didn’t realise they’d need,’ Susanna chimed in, as Richard responded: ‘Absolutely.’
‘He is absolutely the hero of the moment. Yesterday we saw that he’s still there in Kyiv, we know that there are squads out to target him,’ Susanna continued, before wondering whether Zelensky is the reason why British veterans have volunteered to fight alongside Ukraine against the Russian forces.
In his address, Zelensky told Parliament: ‘We will continue fighting for our land, whatever the cost. We will fight in the forests, the fields, the shores and in the streets.’
‘The question for us now is to be or not to be…this Shakespearean question,’ he told the British politicians, who all stood up to applaud him when his speech ended.
‘For 13 days this question could have been asked but now I can give you a definitive answer. It’s definitely yes, to be.
‘And I would like to remind you the words that the United Kingdom have already heard, which are important again: we will not give up and we will not lose.’
Good Morning Britain airs weekdays from 6am on ITV.
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