In 1998 the leadership of the party became Viktor Medvedchuk (later the head of Leonid Kuchma's presidential administration), former Ukrainian president Leonid Kravchuk and Ukrainian tycoon Hryhoriy Surkis. During the presidential term of Leonid Kuchma the party portrayed itself as a centrist, social-democratic moderate political force that advocated integration with Europe and supported the president. The party was closely linked to presidential administration and big business (from Kyiv). According to Ukrainian newspaper "Halytski kontrakty", in 1998 the Cabinet of Ukraine transferred under administration to the Ukrainian Kredit Bank a share stock package of the Zaporizhia Factory of Ferroalloys as well as number of regional power distributors such as Kirovohradoblenergo, Ternopiloblenergo, and Khersonoblenergo. The leaders of social democrats denied any relations to the energy distribution business, and Medvedchuk particularly called it "Child babble" (). However, according to the Siberian newspaper "Negotsiant" the representative of energy interests for the social democrats was someone under the name of Konstantin Grigorishin who is a citizen of the Russian Federation and holds place on supervisory boards for several Ukrainian companies among which are Dniprospetsstal, Zaporizhia Factory of Ferroalloys, Sumyoblenergo and many others. According to Ukrainian informational agency "Prometall" Grigorishin (along with his partners Levon and Aleksandr Vardanyan) is one of the governors of the investment pool company "Court Holding" that owns number of controlling share packages for several oblenergo (power distribution companies). Grigorishin is also the owner of big company "Sozidanie" which owns number of strategically important Ukrainian companies among which is the Sumy Engineering Association. In 2016 in Moscow he was accused for not paying taxes from his business.