Ukraine wants to change rules of selection for Eurovision

27.02.2019 14:42

Ukrinform

The Cabinet of Ministers has ordered the State Committee for Television and Radio Broadcasting and the National Public Broadcasting Company of Ukraine (PBC) to improve the rules for selecting a representative from Ukraine for the Eurovision Song Contest.

A respective decision was adopted at the initiative of Deputy Prime Minister Viacheslav Kyrylenko, according to an Ukrinform correspondent.

"The State Committee for Television and Radio Broadcasting and the National Public Broadcasting Company of Ukraine should improve the rules for selecting a representative from Ukraine for participation in the Eurovision Song Contest, taking into account the circumstances that caused wide public outcry during the selection of a Ukrainian representative in 2019," reads a draft government decision proposed by Kyrylenko.

The deputy prime minister added that wide circles of the Ukrainian public were outraged by the participation in the selection of singers who gave concerts in Russia.

The draft decision also calls on the Verkhovna Rada to urgently consider and approve the draft law on the peculiarities of the holding of the tour and concert activity by persons participating in entertainment events in the territory of the aggressor state and in the temporarily occupied territory of Ukraine.

As was reported earlier, singer MARUV (Hanna Korsun) earned the highest score among six contenders in the final of the Ukrainian national selection for Eurovision 2019 on February 23. This caused a scandal and questions about how performers giving concerts in Russia were admitted to the competition.

The winner of the national selection had to sign a contract with the National Public Broadcasting Company of Ukraine. One of the terms of the contract was the refusal to give concerts in Russia, which the singer scheduled for April. However, the singer and the PBC did not agree on the terms of the contract, and MARUV refused to participate in the contest.

The Freedom Jazz and KAZKA bands, which took second and third places in the national selection, respectively, also turned down the offers to participate in the international song contest.

PBC board member Oleksandr Koltsovs said that Ukraine might not delegate any participant to the Eurovision Song Contest 2019.