Ukrainian TV presenter and journalist Marina Leonchuk for the first time shared details about her dismissal from the 1+1 TV channel in 2017. During an interview with Marichka Padalko’s YouTube channel, the star revealed the reasons why she decided to leave the program “Snidanok z 1+1”.

“Then Anatolych left. And we already talked about this in the dressing room, that when you work on morning broadcasts, it’s such a special story. This is quite, I would even say, such an intimate moment when you wake up in the morning, you are very vulnerable, you listen to yourself, what mood you are in, what mood you need to go with. And you want to have a person next to you whom you trust. Anatolic and I got used to each other for a very long time. Anatolich was a very cool partner. And when you have already learned to work with a partner and then you understand: “Well, that’s it, he leaves and you have a very short period of time, literally two weeks you need to work with a new partner.”. You understand inside whether these two weeks will be enough for you to cooperate, to find it, to get used to it, and whether you had that resource then and whether this is already a way to try something different and give this answer to the question: “Who am I without “1+1”?”? And who am I without a TV presenter console That’s why it turned out that way then,” Marina recalled her thoughts.

Answering the question about the official reasons for the termination of cooperation with the TV channel, the journalist said that the dismissal was by agreement of the parties, but, according to the agreement, she could not talk about it publicly for several years.

“There was such a story written into the contract for three years that I can’t talk about it, but there was no such secret agreement... It seems to me that I could be wrong, but this was already a story about dismissal by agreement of the parties. It was probably like this. Well, it’s necessary to raise documents there,” admitted Leonchuk.

After completing work on “1+1”, Marina began a long period of self-discovery and rethinking of her own identity beyond the usual television image.

“It was a long period and it was a difficult period and it was a period when you had to withstand yourself, because you are used to the fact that I am a journalist, I am a TV presenter, I am the presenter of 1+1, the audience knows me as the presenter of “1+1”. And this period, when you wake up in the morning, you no longer need to go to “Snіdanok with 1+1”, that’s all.

You must understand what you will do, what you will be like, how you feel.. And it was a difficult period, but I am very grateful to this period, because then I began to honestly answer the question: “What does it mean to be who I am?”? "

Three days after her dismissal, Leonchuk got a new job. She worked on the Direct TV channel as a host of political shows until the start of a full-scale invasion.. After this, Marina moved to England and in the first months in exile she worked as a bun saleswoman and barista.