Frankly, I’m sick and tired of hearing the anti-Western and implicitly anti-Ukrainian diaspora rhetoric that has alarmingly crept in over the last months into the so-called political discourse in Ukraine. In fact, I’m offended by it.

It’s time to time to say enough is enough and, calling on others, to stand one’s ground.

It is only to be expected from the pro-Russian forces led by Viktor Medvedchuk, Vadim Rabinovich and others. Or, from the political mouthpieces of rogue billionaire oligarch Igor Kolomoisky fuming at the West for countering his nefarious financing schemes, whether at home or abroad. But when I hear it coming from the likes of Yulia Tymoshenko or the rent-a-political-snarling-clown Oleh Liashko, as well as some supposedly objective commentators, it all seems to fall into some sort of orchestrated pattern.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s,  I was the director of the U.S.-funded Ukrainian Service of Radio Liberty. 30 years ago, in October 1990, I interviewed the future first president of an independent Ukraine, Leonid Kravchuk under a portrait of Vladimir Lenin in his office in the Verkhovna Rada.

I was then the embodiment of an “enemy voice” vilified by the communist authorities of that time. But looking back, I can confidently say that I did not encounter the hatred and disinformation being leveled today from some quarters at those seeking the best for Ukraine in alliance with supportive and forward-looking Democratic forces from the West.

To glibly condemn those who were prepared to invest in Ukraine’s future in a difficult time of transition by providing “grants” to enable its young generation to obtain essential learning, experience, and know-how, was not a devious plot or crime. It was an open and generous act of faith and commitment, and the recipients of this support were encouraged to serve their country as best as their enhanced qualifications would allow them.

Whether the patrons were Hungarian philanthropist and democratic visionary George Soros, the United States,  the European Union, United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, or any other benevolent and well-meaning source, there was no hidden agenda as today’s malevolent detractors allege.  The effort was aimed at equipping modern Ukraine to better manage its affairs in a competent manner reflecting Western democratic norms and procedures.

Excuse me, I say to their critics, if you are advocating an alternative vision of Ukraine, with the retention of its corrupt practices, conservation of the oligarchic set-up, a flawed political system with its wheeling and dealing masquerading as a democracy, exploitation of Western bailouts and contempt for the conditionality attached to them, as well as ambivalence toward the Russian aggressor, then be upfront and tell us where you’re coming from.

The latest voice amplifying this cynical approach belongs to David Zhvania, a businessman and former politician who was close to former President Petro Poroshenko.

As is known he fell out with his political associate and is now gunning publicly for him. We don’t know what his real motives are and who has put him up to it, though reportedly he seems to be in Moscow very often.

Poroshenko had his faults and needs to be thoroughly investigated.  But to accuse him, as Zhvania has just done, among other things, of agreeing to the establishment of a network of Western foreign agents in Ukraine, headed in his words by former Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili, is just way over the top.

To label Western foreigners, brought in as experts or advisers to help the Ukrainian ship of state right itself and steer a European course, as scheming foreign agents is as deliberately malicious as it is reprehensible.

I don’t know who helps Zhvania with his texts, but Moscow’s line shine’s though it.  The Kremlin has not only branded Western NGOs and Soros in Russia as enemies and banned or severely restricted them, but is now evidently seeking to export this narrative to Ukraine.

Unfortunately, given the low level of political culture and political awareness still predominating in a country where the semblance of pluralism in the media is offset by the oligarchic control exercised over them, this recurrent line is also having an effect on more people than I would hope.

In short, colleagues from the diaspora, Western specialists who were or remain active in Ukraine, and donors and patrons, it’s time to react.

We cannot allow this scurrilous disinformation campaign and demonization of precisely those who want to help Ukraine live up to the principles of the Revolution of Dignity to continue unchallenged. Enough is enough. It is time to call a lie a lie, and to engage in damage containment and a constructive counter-offensive.

It’s time to ask those who selectively embrace and detest their Western allies and well-wishers in accordance with political exigencies, to stop playing games. Are you for a modern European Ukrainian democratic state, or are you simply interested in preserving your political and economic advantages and continuing the rot and social manipulation that goes with it?