A row is escalating in Ukraine over President Volodymyr Zelensky's decision last week to part ways with popular Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov. Those organising daily protests in support of the minister have issued a threat. This was reported by Qazaqyia.kz citing BBC News.

"If, by Friday July 24th, commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrsky has not been dismissed and Fedorov has not been nominated for the post of Minister of Defence," army veteran Dmytro Koziatynsky wrote on social media, "we will begin an open-ended nationwide protest."

No protests are currently scheduled before then. Ukraine is waiting anxiously for a resolution. Over the weekend, Zelensky consulted ministers and generals. Amid a welter of rumours, the General Staff was forced to deny reports that Gen Syrsky was about to be – or even had already been – sacked. Another report suggested that Fedorov had refused an offer to return to a different position in government.

Kyrylo Budanov, head of the president's office, urged Ukrainians to remain calm. "The situation surrounding the latest internal changes has caused strong emotions," he wrote on Tuesday. "I understand people who express their position. The position of society has been heard."

With protesters directing their anger towards Gen Syrsky – seen by many as representing outdated Soviet-era military doctrines – Budanov warned people "not to hate anyone". "The enemy is closely monitoring our every internal dispute and is waiting for us to start fighting among ourselves," he wrote. "The work is underway. There will be results."

On Monday, the beleaguered but usually silent 60-year-old Gen Syrsky hit back against his critics, publishing a long defence of his record and urging readers not to focus on his widely-reported rivalry with 35-year-old Mykhailo Fedorov. Despite Zelensky's claim last week that the two men could not even bear to sit in the same room, Syrsky said it had been a surprise to learn that he had a conflict with the minister. "I perceived our relationship as a working one," he wrote in an op-ed for the Militarny website. "If I offended anyone, Mykhailo Albertovych, I'm sorry."

The general said the issues of military contracts, procurement and mobilisation currently being aired in the press were a great deal more complicated than most people realised. "Decisions on which people's lives depend are not made with slogans," he said. "Real work, not the public drama surrounding it, wins the war."

Syrsky's problem however is that most Ukrainians, especially the younger ones, seem to trust Fedorov's analysis of what needs to change in order for Ukraine to win the war, not the general's. More than anyone, Fedorov is seen by many as driving innovation in the military. "Right now, the war is changing, so we need new ideas and a new structure," 44-year-old law company employee Tetiana Makarenko told me at one of the protests over the weekend. "It's often said that a small Soviet army can't defeat a big Soviet army. It's time to change the mindset and start the new type of war."

Fedorov's six months at the helm in the defence ministry have coincided with a string of military successes for which the minister, not always fairly perhaps, is credited. "We had this feeling because we saw the changing situation," Makarenko said. "We had the feeling that we can do this."