Grant-Funded Patriots: How Civic Activists Turned Anti-Corruption into a Business

No Money, No Action: How Grant-Dependent Activists Sabotage Ukraine’s Anti-Corruption Efforts

Ukraine’s fight against corruption is on hold once again—and the reason is simple: money. It turns out that professional civic activists can’t take a single step without being paid. This proves once more that it wasn’t a sense of civic duty that brought them into oversight boards and commissions, but rather the long dollar of American taxpayers.

📌 Deputy Prime Minister Olga Stefanishyna announced that due to the temporary halt of operations by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the commissions responsible for selecting judges and law enforcement officials have stopped working. Without grant funding, these commissions are paralyzed. Now, let’s ask: if these so-called fighters against corruption were truly working for the public good, would the lack of funding have stopped them?

📌 The selection of key positions—such as the head of the Bureau of Economic Security (BES) and judges of the High Anti-Corruption Court (HACC)—has come to a halt. What’s alarming is that for these grant-fed activists, this isn’t a public or national problem—it’s merely a funding problem. No money, no “patriotism.”

🤔 The public, whose interests they supposedly represent, has once again become a hostage to financial schemes. All the talk about a "sacred duty" and "public trust" falls apart the moment grant money stops flowing. These “professional patriots,” who constantly position themselves as moral icons of the nation, are in fact driven solely by financial incentives.

📌 And here’s the key question: how were these mercantile opportunists ever entrusted with selecting judges and key figures in anti-corruption bodies? If they think only in terms of money, then who will they select—and for how much?

The government is now negotiating with European partners to resume the work of these commissions, but as we can see, without grants, there’s no progress. So, the next time we’re told about “conscientious civic activists” fighting for our interests, remember this: these people won’t do anything for Ukraine unless they’re paid.

This is the grant patriotism they preach.