Russia Eurovision Win, Voting Controversy Continues

Last night’s Eurovision Song Contest final in Belgrade, Serbia, has been and gone, and Russia’s Dima Bilan won the international song contest, opening up a whole can of worms about geopolitical and neighborly voting in the process. Ukraine, Greece and Armenia followed with arguably better songs and performances.

As a result, Western European countries are apparently re-evaluating their commitment to Eurovision because of an unhealthy dose of political voting from Eastern bloc and Nordic countries. The BBC reports that Britain’s perennial Eurovision host, Sir Terry Wogan, is even considering calling it a day.

Not that I’ll miss him, but anyway.

Sir Terry cast doubt on his role after saying this year’s results showed it was “no longer a music contest”.

[…]

Sir Terry said his producer, Kevin Bishop, was stepping down after this year’s contest.

“He and I have to decide whether we want to do this again,” he said.

“Indeed, western European participants have to decide whether they want to take part from here on in because their prospects are poor.”

[…]

Russia received the maximum 12 points from former Soviet states Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Ukraine, Belarus and Armenia, as well as Israel.

All Kinds of Everything for Eurovision was even more outraged by Russia’s win. Although the blog says that the song wasn’t “bad per se” it adds that “it was truly not the best song out of 25 .”

Personally i am totally gutted with the result. Its not totally unexpected as Russia was a big favourite. But for me its pretty much the death knell for the eurovision song contest as a truly unbiased contest.

Last year was considered bad enough by many observers what with the dominanant eastern top ten but i consider this result as a lot worse.

EscoToday examines the issue more closely, but points out that it isn’t just the Eastern bloc countries at fault.

Five countries did not award any points to Russia, all of them from Western Europe: Iceland, United Kingdom, Denmark, Switzerland, Sweden and San Marino. Two countries gave only one point to Russia, those were also from Western Europe: the Netherlands and France. The story continues with the only 3 points Russia got which came from Belgium (Russia never scored two). On the other hand, five of Russia’s six sets of 12 points came from former USSR countries. Another 12 came from Israel, a country with a strong Russian diaspora. Other countries that might have profited by diaspora voting are Turkey (10 points from Germany, France, the Netherlands and Belgium) and Armenia (12 points from France, Belgium and the Netherlands) to name two examples. However, these statistics are always pretty unsure as nobody knows who votes for which country.

Five of the six former Yugoslav countries gave their twelve points each other, only F.Y.R. Macedonia gave its top mark to their neighbours from Albania. The Nordic countries also sticked together: Norway got its 12 points from Finland and Sweden, Finland got 14 of its 38 points from Iceland, Norway and Sweden (but no points from Denmark). Although Charlotte Perrelli’s highest vote came from Malta, the second, third and fourth highest marks came from Denmark, Norway and Finland. Iceland got its only 12 points from Denmark.

To be fair to Armenia, the general consensus appears to be that despite Diasporan communities in many countries which voted, Sirusho and Qele Qele were popular on merit alone even if the young singer’s performance was still less than it should have been. Indeed, Armenia received the highest number of full marks — eight, in fact. Even if the Georgian TV presenter could sing Sirusho’s song better than she could, the 12 points was genuine.

Meanwhile, Armenia returned the favor by awarding 10 points to Georgia’s Diana Gurtskaya who really didn’t deserve any. Armenia’s full marks of course went to Russia while Turkey and Azerbaijan formed their own voting bloc by doing the same with each other.

[…] Azerbaijan and Turkey have established a new 12pt exchange group in ESC, to go with Greece and Cyprus (and others), mainly the result of a red strip of their flag and the Crescent/Star emblem.

Incidentally, Turkey awarded 10 points to Armenia, but Armenia and Azerbaijan did not award any points to the other even if in the first semi-final the former gave the later 2 points.

With Azerbaijan ranking 8th with their debut while Georgia came in at 11th, Artmika at Unzipped: Gay Armenia comments on the success of the three South Caucasus republics.

South Caucasus did quite well, overall. During semifinals, Armenia finished 2nd, Georgia - 5th, and Azerbaijan - 6th. And in a final, along with Armenia’s 4th place, Azerbaijan finished at No.8 (exactly the way Armenia did at its first entry to Eurovision contest three years ago). Georgia just missed top ten, finishing 11th this year.

And yes, Armenia awarded 2 points to Azerbaijan during the first semifinal (”2 points from Armenia goes to Azerbaijan”). Good for Armenia. Azerbaijan, in the meantime, awarded Armenia “nil points”… May be in time, may be next year, may be in 5 years things would be different…

I loved so much when Georgian TV representative who presented 12 points to Armenia did it singing Qele Qele. It was super!

A very good showing indeed, and despite her vocals, a deserved fourth place for Sirusho although The Caucasus Knot considers that an undeserved Russian win effectively prevented her from coming in third while top honors probably belonged to Greece with a very catchy number indeed. Ukraine should have been second.

Still, perhaps many people are reading too much into what is a mediocre music contest that isn’t taken seriously anywhere but former Soviet republics and Scandinavia. In a sense, this was what Spain’s, Latvia’s, and Ireland’s entries were all about. The latter’s failed bid with a chicken glove puppet derided bloc voting and was perhaps closer to the reality than any Eurovision commentary to date.

Tragically, Dustin the Chicken failed to make it through to the finals.

Oh, I come from a nation
What knows how to write a song
Oh Europe, where oh where did it all go wrong?
Come on!

[…]

Eastern Europe, we love you
Do you like Irish stew?
Or goulash as it is to you?
(Irlande douze points, Irlande douze points)

Listen Bulgaria, we love you
Belarus, Georgia, Montenegro
Moldovia, Albania, Croatia
Poland, Russia, Ukraine
Macedonia, love you Turkey
Hungary, Estonia, Slovakia
Armenia, Bosnia-Herzegova
And don’t forget the Swiss

But it was Eurovision — the cheesiest song contest there is, so perhaps the last word is best left to the Ferocious Celebrity Blog which comments on the geopolitical controversy in the making as well as Azerbaijan’s somewhat successful debut.

The Eurovision Song Contest is not about which country in Europe makes the best music (without meaning to sound arrogant but let’s just think about world class British bands and artists compared to the same from France, Sweden, Serbia and all the other countries involved) Eurovision is about sitting down for 4 hours in front of the TV each year and laughing at the utter shite that comes onto the stage. Who cares if we don’t win? It’s the taking part that counts remember, and frankly I think that’s one prize our trophy cupboard isn’t too bothered about having!

So back to the actual show, and highlights of the night came from Bosnia & Herzegovina whose troop of knitting brides and odd washing line certainly made it memorable, also Croatia who really should have done better with their 7o year old rapper called 75 Cents, as well as Latvia who did their own reenactment of Pirates of the Caribbean! However my money was on Azerbaijan who had a bizarre act involving angels and the devil, unfortunately they didn’t win.

Incidentally, The Caucasus Knot’s favorite song was Turkey even if a rock song isn’t really appropriate for Eurovision and never stood a chance. Otherwise, a real competition would have probably resulted in a win for Greece with Ukraine, Sweden and Armenia following in that order. Latvia and Spain’s comical entries would have also done well and become summer hits.

But, regardless of the Russian win, Eurovision was fun, it has to be said, and congratulations to Sirusho are deserved and also in order. Even so, if Georgia should have probably won last year’s Eurovision with the fantastic Sopho, if music was the determining factor that is, this year it should have been Greece with Kalomoira or Ukraine in the very shapely form of Ani Lorak. Actually, Greece’s entry was a perfect mixture of ethnic and pop music while Ukraine was the best eye candy of the night. And the song wasn’t bad either.