Romania’s Head of Delegation Iuliana Marciuc says she does not understand why the EBU cancelled Romania’s jury vote — or why the 12 points Bucharest awarded to Moldova instead went to Ukraine.
On Sunday, Marciuc told Telejurnal that the Romanian jury had followed all the rules set forth by the EBU, so were taken aback when their result was annulled. She describes phoning home during rehearsals to see how things had gone.
“I called Bucharest, I asked to be given the score, because up to that moment I didn’t know it and I asked for details about how the jury was organized in the studio.”
“I learned that it was organized with all the rules imposed by the EBU, with the presence of a notary mandatory, [who arrived] in the studio before the jury members. The members of the jury could not communicate with each other. They could not talk. Each person signed his jury sheet. They did not even see the final result of the jury. We don’t know what the problem is with [our jury vote].”
But on Saturday night, during the grand final, the European Broadcasting Union sent out a vague statement which said it had found “irregular voting patterns” detected among six unnamed countries after second rehearsals for the second semi-final. Their jury votes were cancelled and replaced with “a substitute aggregated result for each country concerned for both the Second-Semi Final and the Grand Final (calculated based on the results of other countries with similar voting records).”
In the aftermath of that, it’s become clear that the six countries in question are: Azerbaijan, Georgia, Montenegro, Poland, Romania, and San Marino.
During the live broadcast three of these countries — including Romania — experienced “technical difficulties”, which led to EBU Executive Supervisor Martin Osterdahl to read the results out loud himself. Footage has emerged showing the Romanian spokesperson in position and ready to deliver Romania’s points. Naturally she’s in shock when she isn’t able to do so.
Romanian spokeperson finds out LIVE at the same time as all of us about the "technical dificulties" that EBU reported last night. This also happened to Georgia and Azerbaijan.
Earlier, on Sunday morning, Romanian television posted this lengthy statement on their official Eurovision page.
We’ve embedded it below, and also pasted the text in case the Facebook embed isn’t loading.
“Romanian Television has fully committed to participating in Eurovision 2022, paying the participation fee and preparing, together with its WRS team, a project that enjoyed the public’s appreciation.”
“However, we were surprised to find that the result of the Romanian jury’s vote was not taken into the final ranking, with the organizers assigning another set of scores to the competitors in the final, on behalf of our country’s jury. We specify that the jury in Romania decided to grant a maximum score to the representatives of Moldova.”
“In a message transmitted to the representatives of the participating countries, on Saturday night, just during the announcement of the results of the vote of the national juries for the ESC final (around 01.00), the EBU reported that: ‘In order to comply with the Contest’s Voting Instructions, the EBU worked with its voting partner to calculate a substitute aggregated result for each country concerned for both the Second-Semi Final and the Grand Final (calculated based on the results of other countries with similar voting records).’”
“In the message, Romania was not explicitly nominated on the list of the six countries, nor did it receive, at the end of the second semifinal, which specifies the identification of ‘irregular voting patterns’, an official communication regarding a suspect Here are the organizers regarding the jury vote in Romania.
The person appointed by TVR to manage communication with the EBU for the national jury vote noted the discrepancy between the scores transmitted the previous day, after the show for the jury, and the notes EBU announced during the event that it will introduce them to the rankings, as from the national jury.
At the same time, the presenter Eda Marcus was not allowed to enter the official broadcast to communicate the results, as TVR had previously agreed with the organizers, according to procedures. Furthermore, during Saturday, the TVR polling officer attended two teleconferences with organizers to establish rules for presentation/positioning/reading of Eda Marcus. He also participated in the rehearsal of transmitting the jury result, without receiving any communication regarding any suspicions or the organizer’s intention to make changes to the Romanian jurors’ vote.”
“We emphasize that the national jury watched the show after which it voted in the presence of a notary and respected the regulation imposed by the organizer. We reiterate the fact that neither the juries nor the TVR representatives were announced, after the second semifinal, of the existence of some suspicions about the Romanian vote.”
“So the rules were changed during the game without the participants being notified beforehand, knowing during the broadcast that some votes of the national judges were modified by the organizer.”
“In this out of the ordinary context, which surprised us unpleasantly, TVR asked the organizers of ESC to provide us, officially, the concrete reasons why they replaced the score of the jury in Romania with a calculated ‘substitute’…Based on the response we will be sent, TVR reserves the right to take action to correct the situation.”
“Despite this situation, Romania’s representatives fully deserved their participation in the final, wrs provided an impeccable moment at every appearance on stage, receiving very good reactions in the hall, online or in meetings le with the journalists.”
“Romanians experienced the emotions of the Eurovision show together with the representative of our country, TVR registering double audiences compared to the 2021 broadcast – TVR 1 took third place in the audience ranking, with Saturday’s final followed by 370 000 viewers, on average per minute.”
I love the background information! It’s very interesting to read about what occurs behind the scenes.
Andrei
2 years ago
They’ve tried to make all the six countries read the votes they were given by EBU. So, they tried to make it appear that they were doing nothing wrong. How many other countries received the imposed list and just agreed to say the votes?
David Lennon
2 years ago
I hope we get credible explanations/evidence asap to clear this up. No-one likes ‘foul play’ but equally if it turns out a country’s jury was DQd to be replaced by an algorithm, that’s just as bad. EBU, be open and transparent about this. Trust is important, make sure we all know – and if necessary make changes, if not boast about cheat-catching. Either way front up and let everyone know, jmho xx
Joselito
2 years ago
All I know is that the longer it takes to give the proper explanations, EBU is more suspicious. EBU should do something NOW! And explain everything, with full details
The big mouths that have been opened talking sh*t was EBU! They can’t even explain why they did that. The broadcasters are right.
ady
2 years ago
the biggest face fraud committed by ebu .
Satsuma
2 years ago
How can we have the real votes of the 6 jury at the first place plz?
Xellow
2 years ago
What i think happened here and dont get me wrong , the Romanian jury at least 3 of the members are reputable persons they even represented Romania in the contest … Ovi Jacobsen is not only respected in Romania but in Norway and Swizerland as well , he was even the jury for Swizerland in the last 3 years … they wont risk themself and damage their reputation for a contest where Romania not even qualified for 2-3 years , as well from what i know the jury was not public until late so who would had time to make… Read more »
It is kinda fact that sympathy voting and strategic voting are happening.
Note how the Nordic countries often give high numbers to other nordic countries and east europe also votes for each other.
Romania was voted poorly by the jury in the semi final as well as the grand final. The televotes saved the country
ThorBeta
2 years ago
The situation is really getting hilarious and annoying at the same time lo so I think we need to ease down a bit. If someone would put the situation between the involved parties in simple words it would probably look be like this: -EBU: I cancelled some juries because their semifinal results were irregular. -TVR: Oh EBU is so unfair. They cancelled our jury’s final results. Here they are, they look fine. -Fans: EBU, why did you cancel TVR’s final results? They look fine. -EBU:… -Other fans: Oh wait, EBU actally said that they cancelled the juries because their semifinal… Read more »
TVR had a full show tonight with full of accusation on EBU , i mean if you know you cheated you should stfu and try to stop it in silence . Iuliana : “Up to this hour we didnt received any response from EBU , i know are other countries involved and we still wait their answer , it was only one person in Romania who knew the results of the jury vote , the producer who was main responsible for the votes , in the moment when she received another list with other votes from EBU she got alarmed… Read more »
There is another tactic that you use when you know that you are wrong and that that’s called distraction. The more wrong you are the more you shout to shift the attention. Very common in the Balkans hahaha.
And that’s exactly what TVR is doing: they keep talking about the final when the EBU statement is very clear: “certain irregular voting patterns” in the SEMIFINAL. Why TVR isn’t saying a word about the semifinal and keeps shouting about the final? That’s what I call very loud distraction in my Balkan village. 😉
Romania is not in balkan .. you want me to teach you some Geography ?
Balkan Countries ListThe Balkan States are; Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro, Kosovo, Slovenia, Albania, North Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Hungary, Greece and Turkey (the lands are located in European Continent).
I’ve read your source’s text mate and it is kind of inconsistent/messy. Geographically speaking, just a very small part of Romania – 4,6% (as Turkey – 3% and Italy – 0.1%) is in the Balkans. Historically speaking, you can say Romania is in the Balkans based on country’s interconnections within this area throughout centuries . However, your source has been amended by others as not so precise though. (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balkans and others).
Mate, geography is one thing and culture another, and the term Balkan has various uses – see the Balkan sprachbund for example. The link from Brittanica was a random source out of thousands you can find online. Most -not all of them- include Romania in the Balkan states. Romania is also member of various “Balkan” organisations. So, yeah Romania is Balkans definitely much more than Hungary is lol
My fellow countrymen must have been sent by TVR themselves to defend their bluff or are just doing it through blind patriotism, but I’ve got to tell you, this whole fiasco is not surprising at all when you’re familiar with the kind of shameless, shady BS they try pulling off, this year’s selection process being massive proof of it and that’s just one clear, recent example.
Oh don’t worry, my fellow countrymen (Greeks) would have done the exact same thing, blindly supporting ERT. I think ERT scrapped cancelling their jury by pure luck btw – their votes in their final look very sketchy.
Yeah, the infamous Dream Team connections, lol. At least ERT made an effort to find something really nice to send to the contest this year, TVR can’t even do that!
Regardless, what broadcasters like TVR and ERT (and many others) are doing with their juries is a joke. I don’t expect fans to open their eyes and realise how much this is damaging the reputation of their own countries in Eurovision tbh. For people from the Balkans it’s always someone else’s fault. 😉
For Romanian and Moldova it was far deep for it speaks of a dream that could not be spoken before. I saw Romania had 0 points (i am romanian) I could not sleep all night. People just do not understand. We fought centuries with many empires, to be together. For us, it was the sound of beauty.
It would be exactly the same for Greeks and Cypriots, so I do understand (being a Greek). A “12 points” given by a Eurovision jury is not so important though and your people (in both sides of the borders) know that very well.
Satsuma
2 years ago
I’m french so i’m not gonna try to say france was robbed lol. However clearly Spain was robbed of her second place in my opinion…. When you see the final jury votes, those same votes that was changed by EBU was made like this. Four of them have had the exactly same order (again order remade by ebu) Azerbaijan: 12/UK, 10/ITALY, 8/SWEDEN, 7/PORTUGAL, 6/UKRAINE, 5/SPAIN, 4/NETHERLANDS, 3/GREECE, 2/POLAND, 1/FRANCE Georgia: The same order was given by the EBU…. 12/UK, 10/ITALY, 8/SWEDEN, 7/PORTUGAL, 6/UKRAINE, 5/SPAIN, 4/NETHERLANDS, 3/GREECE, 2/POLAND, 1/FRANCE Romania: 12/UKRAINE, 10/SWEDEN, 8/UK, 7/PORTUGAL, 6/AUSTRALIA, 5/SWITZERLAND, 4/ITALY, 3/NETHERLANDS, 2/GREECE, 1/SPAIN Poland:… Read more »
SanAntonious
2 years ago
IF you think Eurovision is fair competition you are naive , unsure what is the surprise here.
Midnight Gold
2 years ago
TVR is not fooling anyone, disclose the 2nd semi jury rankings in full or shut up about it, you corrupt b*stards.
This needs to be clarified soon. The longer the time it takes to give some public explanations the worse for the credibility of the EBU. I am Spanish and I would haved loved if Chanel would have come second. But I prefer third, where she is, because putting into disrepute the EBU is not good news.
Yay
2 years ago
This just seems plain unfair to me and I am confused on why the EBU did this. I wonder if Ukrainian is our real winner? (Seems unlikely but who knows?)
They deserve the win, if the EBU didn’t hack it’s jury results into giving points for Ukraine.
Why they deserve to win ???? Because they have the war in their country…that’s why???
Hello this is a contest for music….best musicians, not politicians… i am sory for what is happening there…but each country with their issues …..
The way that the places where before Ukraina and Serbia was the correct classification….
Very disappointed ?
There is by the way an obvious reason why Ukraine got so many Viewer Votes.
The rules are simple.
– 1 number can vote up to 20 times
– A (as an example) German Number can’t vote for Germany (i.e can’t vote for your own country from that country)
Now this is not to diminish any achievements or blame them for this.
But Ukraine had a huge advantage because many Ukrainians are currently scattered across Europe, thus able to actually vote for Ukraine.
Sam
2 years ago
It’s been 4 days since the contest. The EBU is dealing with it and investigating and will release their evidence as and when. This is not about us fans and we have no right being impatient and demanding answers from the EBU when the EBU is probably waiting on answers from Azerbaijan etc. I also think people are making a lot of assumptions, namely, that these 6 countries all worked together as a group. Actually, it’s possible there are several different alliances within these 6. For example, San Marino and Poland; Azerbaijan and San Marino and Azerbaijan and Georgia therefore… Read more »
Honestly, I don´t like the fact they are taking so long to give proper explanations. They lose credibility that way. You have to be very sure of what you do if you exclude some countries votes, because that is a very serious decision. If you are that sure you should have the evidence ready to be made public. Otherwise, you risk be acussed of manipulation.
I believe everything was done correctly but I am still in the need of proper explanations.
Since they decided to REPLACE Romanian jury votes with their own votes, it seems to me that the decision was adopted upon some pretty good motives. The Romanian EV team wants to know those motives and why the replacement was only “thrown in face” LIVE on TV, although the results of the Romanian jury votes were already known by EBU 48 hours before the show. This is completely unprofessional and disappointing. What would you say when, for example, the voting elections for EU Parliament were to be “handled” the same way? Huh?
No. They told us huge lies about connection problems (sic) in our faces and they replace in our faces the….”irregular” juries….with ebu regularity. North Korea prevails !
No they didn’t. I didn’t read EBU saying anything about connection problems. They announced that they identified “voting irregularities” in the semifinal results and they cancelled the respective juries. Get your facts right.
Yes, EBU did replacedRomanian’s juring votes And it did say that there are connection issues. I saw the grand final live 😉 so if youre just talking to waste our time do it somewhere else but do not contradict if you didnt even watch the contest!
Jesse O’Rourke
2 years ago
It was all fixed.
Xellow
2 years ago
besides the last 2 members which i dont know .. the other 3 are past participants and seriously i found it hard to believe they had anything to do with arranging the votes … Sanda Lado?i, Lumini?a Anghel, Ovi Jacobsen, Liviu Eleke? ?i Mihai Pocorschi
Are we sure EBU didnt changed their votes in semifinal and final for bookmakers ? The competition is already very suspicious and we already have issues … This competition should never be listed for bettings sites just for this reason .
Patrick
2 years ago
To me it seemed the aggregate scores attributed to the six nations were more suspicious. Strange that the disqualifications and substitute votes csme after the televote had been collated. There is no way those countries would have voted so heavily for the UK. To me it seemed to be about getting the UK into second place – possibly in the hope it will stage for Ukraine next year???
Sognomio
2 years ago
The Rai comentator was horrible and what he said about some songs and especially against Chanel was disgusting.You can have your own pleausures and likes but never insult singers and countries
Find it hard to believe that the Georgian broadcaster cheated. Judging by what they send every year they are clearly not that interested in getting a good result.
Karworld
2 years ago
On the news today, they mention the problem was those 6 countries gave 12 points to Cyprus on SF2. EBU found that suspicious. So far only Romania has provided their real jury voting and they would have altered the final outcome. It would be interesting to see the voting of the other juries too. EBU says they are still revising. … OK….
Jonkonfui
2 years ago
I dont understand why would a country cheat. What is it so important about getting a decent or bad result for a country? Is it just out of national pride? Do countries receive any kind of compensation according to what position do they get at Esc?.
Just to say that the last Chanel’s press conference took place in Madrid this morning. Obviously the Spanish Delegation was asked about the controversy, they just said it is EBU the one who will give explanations. So apparently they will do so… at some point.
Another mention to the RAI’s conductor who sent an apology video and a bunch of roses to Chanel (he called her cheap J.Lo during the voting time). Well done, everybodyy can make a mistake and acknowledge it and saying sorry is not easy. Not everyone would do that.
He was the worst ever. She should give a bunch of roses to Ronela because he said “i will sue her designer” and two bunches to Moldova guys cause he said “i better take a train to hell than take their train with this music”
To disrespect someone in this way is not a mistake. It is something you have or dont have inside. And this italian guy, apologies or no apologies has this filth inside.
He dared to make such comments because Ronela and Zdob and Zdub are the representants of two countries, Albania and Moldova, that are constantly facing racisism. Of course, he apologized to Chanel, the representant of Spain. This is so racist and disgusting. Fascism at its worst!
I think he apologized to Spain because RTVE did their job and asked for explanations. Maybe the responsibles of Albania and Moldova televisions should do the same.
Hannah
2 years ago
The EBU don’t have to provide anything to the public but the Romanian broadcaster hasn’t provided them willingly.
The votes of every country and for every country in the semifinale are public. Romania has also made the rankings public. Maybe it’s time for EBU to give an explanation for what happened. Maybe not to us, but at least to the countries whose votes EBU changed. After 2 days they still don’t have a reaction from EBU. Although I have to admit that we have to show some understanding for EBU. It seems EBU changed partially the votes of more countries besides those 6, so it needs some time to fabric some good explanation…I suppose.
I don’t think I own any clarifying to anyone, but please look into the Romanian media, you will find the document, I’m not going to write everything down myself. 🙂
Me? Complaining? I refuse to believe EBU only because of its blue eyes and I would like an explanation from EBU. For the rest I don’t care too much because all I wanted was for Ukraine to win. And that is a fact. So peace! 🙂
Well, there is an official explanation from TVR. You can google for it. It is amazing how Eurovision is taking advantage of some countries and after all this disgusting treatement, those countries are the ones accused of mockery and not EBU. So disrespectful especially that the spokeperson of Romania did all the official rehearsal, she was ready to go live and Eurovision’s official just decide to cut her off the last moment. So unethical, disrespectful and disgusting, an insult not only to TVR, but to the country itself. They should be ashamed!
I’ve googled it, I’ve translated it and I’ve read it. I doesn’t address the main issue which is the semifinal voting. Can TVR provide us of that information to clarify things for good? Thank you
Really? Are you accusing a person she is lying when there is an official statement everywhere on the internet with the official results of the Romanian jury? Maybe the other countries did not provide any, but Romania did! Racism at its peak once again.
EBU is pathetic. With this logic, all 12 points given to Ukraine should be deducted because they were given due to the current political situation.
They also rigged even the “public” votes. A lot of people voted out of pity, but EBU obviously contributed.
Oh, and this was the worst organized ESC ever.
Those votes are not about giving points to Ukraine because they would get points back.
In addition, the rule only applies to the jury’s points, not the viewers’.
Let’s be real here. What sounds more plausible? That the EBU personally fixed SIX countries votes so that they could purposefully dictate what places 2nd – 5th (because let’s face it, Ukraine was always going to win)… or that there was infact corruption within those country’s jury votes. It might not even be the jurors themselves, it could be their HoD, but somewhere along the line, something majorly fishy happened. The only reason it is more outrageous this time is because there was six countries instead of just one or two. I highly doubt the EBU would seriously risk their… Read more »
You do know what countries you are talking about, right, that have presumably “exchanged votes”? Just making sure you have a clear idea about the situation and you’re not jumping on the train “we say they cheated so it’s easy to point the finger”. I think this is the fault of the 3rd party, the one responsible for analysing the votes, who became a little bit too eager. I honestly hope there was no foul play from EBU.
Ye, I think it’s extremely strange for some of those countries involved, and not so much others (without naming names). It’s just using common sense, I think the EBU have more to lose and less to gain by cheating in comparison to a country entering, d’ya get me? It could however be a mess up with the voting partner. I think this is something that needs full transparency, and if it does shame some countries, and the knock on effect is the cost of ‘x’ many countries leaving the contest, then so be it. It’s not ideal, it’s not what… Read more »
“Let’s be real here. What sounds more plausible?” … Such a manipulative introduction mate. You’ve already made your mind before analyzing the facts and your logic is full of … no logic. Did you think a moment that they’re accusing 6 countries of irregularities/rigging vote? Not one, not two, not even four … SIX countries. Did you think a second why Poland and Romania, both of them with years of good reputation in ESC and within EBU, would suddenly start to put their reputation and income benefits from ESC and other European media shows at risk?
That’s rather rude, and extremely presumptuous considering you do not know me personally. All subjective and unfounded. In which sphere is this manipulative? That I would lead with common sense instead of patriotic bias or emotion? I have no allegiance nor disdain to any country (including my own), nor the EBU. I value people, honesty, respect and fairness. Poland & Romania’s jury points in Semi #2 are exactly the same as each other. San Marino & Georgia’s jury points in Semi #2 are exactly the same as each other. With Azerbaijan sharing the exact same Top 6 as the latter… Read more »
That’s extremely presumptuous considering you do not know me personally. All subjective and unfounded. In which sphere is this manipulative? That I would lead with common sense instead of patriotic bias or emotion? I have no allegiance nor disdain to any country (including my own), nor the EBU. I value people, honesty, respect and fairness. My ‘logic’ – Poland & Romania’s jury points in Semi #2 are exactly the same as each other. San Marino & Georgia’s jury points in Semi #2 are exactly the same as each other. With Azerbaijan sharing the exact same Top 6 as the latter… Read more »
Manipulative? That’s extremely presumptuous, rude, subjective and unfounded. I lead with common sense instead of patriotic bias or emotion. I have no allegiance nor disdain to any country (including my own), nor the EBU. I value people, honesty, respect and fairness. My ‘logic’ – Poland & Romania’s jury points in Semi #2 are exactly the same as each other. San Marino & Georgia’s jury points in Semi #2 are exactly the same as each other. With Azerbaijan sharing the exact same Top 6 as the latter two. I have analyzed the facts. I am not privy to what went on… Read more »
In the name of “honesty, respect and fairness” I will provide you a (not so)short answer: My statement is not “extremely presumptuous, rude, subjective and unfounded”. It is Psychology 101… precisely Behavioral Psychology. There are certain phrases identified as patterns in human actions and behavior and yours “Let’s be real here. What sounds more plausible?” and “[…]d’ya get me?”, say: I know the truth and you (listeners/readers) don’t, so listen to me because I know better. The: “I think the EBU have more to lose and less to gain by cheating in comparison to a country entering,[…]” strongly emphasized by… Read more »
Hypothetical that they choose based on what benefits the EBU and removes false votes when it benefits them.
But these are countries with a history of cheating on jury points
Really? Please explain this history of Romania of cheating on jury points at Eurovision. Because I find this a total lack of respect to throw these accusations without any factual basis.
PP77
2 years ago
With this vote of 6 fake juries who collect most points Sweden, UK.
Writckut
2 years ago
More than 48 hours later and EBU does not clarify anything or provide evidence. This sucks.?
In Spain we had a lot of controversy about Benidorm Fest. But RTVE did what it was needed: calling the press the day after and explaining every single detail about the results. Why EBU don’t do something like this? By not clarifying, they are making the controversy grows bigger and bigger.
There were no irregularities in Spain. Those who moaned obviously didn’t look up the rules that were published months in advance. All the contestants knew what they were signing up for.
It was also just one country so you can’t really compare the situation.
I think you actually can. Apparently, this was also at Eurovisions’ rules, also published months in advance. Nothing to fear from their side if this is so. But they need to explain it publicly.
Aruela
2 years ago
New updates coming fresh from the Romanian Broadcaster TV news – in the Grand Final it seems EBU had sent the changed jury scores to more than 6 broadcasters. Some of them accepted to announce the EBU scores and “went live”. Those who refused suddenly experienced “technical difficulties”. NO Comment EBU, other than rage. I am glad Ukraine won and it was an emotional moment coming together to vote and show support, but it was tinted by such shenanigans.
They were in shock when they have been announced last moment about some invented results by EBU. The Romanian spokeperson was not even allowed to go live, she was cut off. You should be ashamed of your obviously racists comments. In 2022, you should know better, but the fascism is still alive obviously.
I’m not a fan of Eurovision. But this “scandal” caught my attention. I don’t know anything about Polish broadcaster. I’m Romanian myself and I don’t understand why it can be a problem that Romanian jury gave 12 points to Moldova. But because of some “tehnical issues”, these 12 points went to Ukraine.
Also, I dare to ask you why do you think just Polish and Romanian broadcasters “are simplu salty caught cheating”?? If EBU noticed an attempt of cheating from Azerbaijan, Georgia, San Marino etc, too!
MadProfessor
2 years ago
Eurovision and corruption: It has always being going on with juries and everybody knows about it especially the Ebu and the fans although they’d like to pretend otherwise especially in regards with their own country. Fans will accuse any other country for doing it except their own. This years problem wasn’t the usual exchange of 12 points. That can be somewhat explained by other conditions and the Ebu turns a blind eye cause it cant be attributed to an agreement. Six countries in the 2nd semi collaborated and voted all the other 5 in their top 5 positions and deliberately… Read more »
By that logic no one can vote for the same songs, even if they’re good. Everything you just said is flawed, and EBU is pathetic for doing this secretly.
They literally cannot prove why someone voted for someone. They’re just being hypocritical because they don’t like the votes.
Let’s just deduct all 12 and 10 points given to Ukraine, because those were obviously given due to the current situation there.
It doesn’t sound right because in Semi final 2 Romania gave Sweden their highest points and I seriously doubt Sweden would have to bribe any jurors as they usually get good scores regardless. Secondly Romania gave Poland 0 points in the semi final, if those two had an agreement it would have been a really lousy one for Poland.
@Camilla: I think you’re talking about the artificial points, not the rigged ones. Poland really didn’t need to get involved in this, but maybe they were building relationships for the next year.
PURRRRRRR
2 years ago
Honestly…Moldova fairly deserved their top points…not ZERO. This recalculated score is so unfair…I saw the full jury vote and honestly everything looked predictable? The only thing was that Sweden was very low (can happen) and Azerbaijan was 5th (a jury bait song so i think 5th is not that crazy…)
I hope they again recalculate the final score…because Spain came 2nd…and this year the 2nd place is going to be remember as the “”real winner””
Agree. I don’t understand this. So Romania did something bad at the SF, but the country being prejudiced from EBU’s solution is Moldova?
Sorry, but I truly believe that they should look for another way to counter fraud, like economic sanctions.
Ukraine is the winner. Full stop. Let me give you a comparison. When going to a restaurant, your perceived satisfaction does not only depend on the food and it’s ingredients…plating, service, ambiance, seating, etc.. all contribute to your experience. Same here. Personal preferences are complex. Public voting decisions are based on a combination of many factors, including the geo political situation. And what’s better on having a meaningful and symbolic song with such a real impact on peoples life…in other words, Stefania is a legitimate and perfect winner.
No, he said nothing like that. Just the hosts said something in that sense. Regarding Azerbaijan, he said “…we seem to have a problem there.” And then announced the points. It seems that the points are basically this years’ average, adjusted slightly following long-term patterns.
No, this maybe happened to Azerbaijan, but the Romanian spokeperson was clearly cut off, because of “connections issues”. She has posted the live video with her reaction on her instagram, she was in shock.
Mika is in que, prompted to talk with Romania spokewoman, but suddenly Martin intervene and cut the connection, watch the video again, Mika almost arise an argument with Martin. Shame
The fact that you’re being downvoted for mentioning the facts is a new low for Wiwibloggs. Honestly the level of stupidity in here is similar to the one you’d find in antivaxxer fora.
It was both I think because the while issue with Romania being suspected is because they gave Poland 0 points in the semi final but 8 in the final. But seriously aten’t juries allowed to change their mind if someone do and extra good job in the final?
Now, this is a good point. I liked the Czech performance in the SF & voted for them. But in the GF their performance was very shrill & I voted for other countries. Was I supposed to still vote for them?
How do you know this since the semi final votes aren’t published. The only semi final votes we have are the aggregated results so not the supposed rigged ones
Sam
2 years ago
Everyone was trusting the EBU up until these broadcasters speaking. Come on guys, OF COURSE they’re going to deny it! When have any broadcasters or jurors admitted to fudging their rankings before?! I still trust the EBU on this and believe that they believe they detected inconsistencies. As almost everyone has said, most of these countries have clearly been guilty of this before and we should be glad that Osterdahl is doing something about it.
No, Something smell fishy inside the board. Have you heard that EBU sucks RAI before the contest began? Only intellectual people can think of it. Manipulation and massive action for their unwanted plans, everything is different what they are agreed upon and ackward procedure to the setup. Releasing a statement a possible hackers attack on EBU web. Italy is well competent when it comes web hackering and detected before infiltrate. Have you ask also, why all RAI own production number perfectly shown like “FAI RUMORE, MIKA ACT, IL VOLO, LAURA MEDLEY, memorable opening of GF and both opening of SF.… Read more »
I’ve never read so many words in my own language without understanding a single thing before in my life.
60 yearsESCfollower
2 years ago
Ukraine will win every ESC the next 5 to 10 years as their spread out expats will vote for the home country. That is a fact of ESC, countries with large number of guest workers/visitors vote for their country of origin.
That’s why Turkey always got high points from Germany. Applies to all, just look who works or studies in which country and you know who gets the points.
Me Me
2 years ago
Everyone is getting distracted by the jury vote where the real cheating lies in the televote. No way Ukraine got 12 points from 38 out of 40 countries. There’s no way. Even for a pity vote. Televote is easy to manipulate because no one will ever see the true results. This is scary because EBU can determine who they want to win in the future.
It is much easier to cheat with the jury groups as the jury’s points are based on people that the TV companies appoint to their own country.
The telephone voting is based on the random people who text / telephone and the result is not the responsibility of the TV company
It is true that the TV viewers can not control whether the other voting people, voted like that, but the result, counting the votes, the TV company has no responsibility over
ete sech
2 years ago
Yesterday I thought that the “irregularities” detected by EBU were real even though I already thought that making up a new scoreboard for the affected countries was arbitrary.
Now I think it’s just pure corruption and rigging given that the affected broadcasters are speaking up and that we can see that their actual votes made more sense while EBU isn’t saying a word at all, which is sad and outrageous
Yeah yeah fire
2 years ago
In case of Romania, it seems natural to me they would give their 12 points to Moldova… especially because moldovian song sang about their friendly relations….
It’s more than just “friendly relations”. Moldova and Romania used to be the same country until it was forcefully annexed by Stalin’s Soviet Union, and the song is about the deep connection we share so, there’s that
Actually, the Cypriot juries placed Greece third (8 points) in 2022. In 2021, Cyprus had Greece 1st (12p) while Greece had Cyprus 2nd (10p). In 2019 they did exchange the 12 points. In 2018 the Greek jury had Cyprus 2nd (10p) In 2017 Cyprus had Greece 2nd (10p) while Greece had Cyprus 3rd (8p).
Also, just like Romania and Moldova were the same countries until the Soviet Union split them, Greece and Cyprus are the same nation. We have the same TV and music industry; hell, we even have the same national anthem.
No this does not happen every year…be careful other time dear.
Elsa
2 years ago
I think EBU should do it the other way around. Let the spokespersons give their televote points and get a jury of international people evaluate the songs.
I can’t believe the Romanian jury was giving Moldova 12 points cos of quality song and honestly Scandinavia, Balkans and Baltic blocks have been doing the same exchange of top votes between them for decades, so not exactly that objective either
It’s funny how block voting become a problem only when Eastern countries joined the contest and outnumbered the Western ones.
Ireland and The UK used to exchange points all the time before 2009 Portugal and Spain, Greece and Cypress, Scandinavians amongst themselves as well and nobody made an issue of that for 50 editions of the contest.
If you check your facts. There are serious pattern studies made on Eurovision. The nordics are not voting to each other in the way as the eastern European countries that vote to each other whatever song they sent. That is not the case in the Northern Europe. That us is a fact. The Eastern Europe is the most biased . Both the juries and the public in the eastern part of Europe vote for each other more than others.
This is what one of the articles says: “ As a closing note, I think it is worth mentioning that the judge voting appears to have less bias. It is far from perfect, but it is reassuring that the professionals are more objective than the public.” Taken from https://towardsdatascience.com/identifying-voting-blocs-in-the-eurovision-song-contest-4792065fc337. So if we would go to 100 % televoting some countries would never win.
People from similar countries have similar taste in music. I don’t see how that’s wrong.
Most people in Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro and Macedonia listen to literally the same songs.
Same is obvious in some other regions.
Just let people vote, don’t meddle.
No then the contest would die, because Some countries will have zero possibility to win and withdraw. That was about to happen when there was 100% televotes. The song competition became a circus with block voting from the east. Some westerner countries wanted to withdraw. They had to reintroduce the juries to balance.
Agree if any international jury group or jury members per country are appointed by the EBU.
There are advantages to a jury, but extensive cheating has taken place, for example in 2013.
Or probably in 2011. For example, it is obvious that San marino and many others had a pact in semifinal 1.
San marino gave points to countries in principle which then gave back points to them and with each other.
Andu
2 years ago
and btw …United kingdom would return back for 10 years on the bottom of the ranking , if Sweden would have sent this song at ESC they would have definetly won it … ESC most corrupted contest ever .
Kohen
2 years ago
I hate to say that, but now I understand better why Turkey withdrew from the competition after 2012. Everything about to contest is just political..
I am sure that they knew the irregularities in the jury voting but they never explained it because the country that “committed” this irregularity most clearly was their “brother country” ouch..
Check above some countries would suffer from that. The public is more biased. Maybe the semifinals should be decided according to voting patterns. All the east in one semifinal and the west in another.
…but that would be against the nr. 1 purpose of this contest: to build bridges between countries who have no connections. It’s better like this: to mix east & west & then make sure they vote for the most deserving songs.
Because the EBU needs to make sure the “right” song wins & the “right” songs reach TOP 5 & the “right” songs reach TOP10.
I don’t know what went on this year, I don’t know why Romania is publicly complaining that their jury vote was “corrected”. But I am pretty sure it wasn’t just this year that the EBU “corrected” the jury votes of some countries, all the countries?, the weakest link countries?
Why pretend on the night that this was down to ‘technical difficulties’? And why was Österdahl wearing headphones for the first announcement? Surely he already knew he was about to appear on camera. I hope we get the rest of the story.
Kohen
2 years ago
I saw on twitter that Azerbaijan might be withdraw from 2023 contest after all the scandals
It seems Romania to withdraw from 2023. The jury was Ovi(who is half norvegian) from Esc 2010 when he finished 3rd, Luminita Anghel who also finished 3rd, Ladosi from esc 2006 so they are very respectable and fair jurors. This was nothing to do with their corruption. The norvegian EBU director didnt like the jurrors vote so he punished these countries. As a Eurovision fan for me this was a really wake up call. This contest was far from fair. I get that Ukraine had to win.It was a good song but not the best by far. If this is… Read more »
The only thing I’ll miss if we actually withdraw is being able to vote for the few countries that bother sending decent stuff to the contest, we hardly ever do that, it’s usually novelty and kitsch all the way as far as we’re concerned (Cezar, Paula and Ovi 2014, Ovidiu Anton, the yodel-rap mishmash, WRS and so on…).
Obviously, their jury does not vote freely.
For example, look at how their jury voted in 2014, very extremely equal for all members
Andu
2 years ago
Okay but you have the votes of jury in second semifinal on official site …. so Romania jury gave 12 points to Sweden , 10 points to Australia , 8 points to Czech Republic , 7 points to Estonia , 6 points to Belgium , 5 points to Macedonia , 4 points to Finland , 3 points to Azjerbadjan , 2 points to San Marino and 1 point to Israel … sorry but i dont see any pattern in this . In finale they voted 12 to Moldova (which was not in second semifinal and 10 points to Greece which… Read more »
No, that’s the aggregate replacement jury vote. There’s no detailed breakdown per each member of jury in the Semi-Final results of these 6 countries, when there is one for every other country. Also Poland which is in the same pot with Romania has the exact same jury results in Semi 2 – they are both the aggregate jury votes from their pot.
Is nowhere saying anything about aggregate replacement votes in semifinales … because that would have changed maybe the entire qualification table .. as well Romania only had 18 points from jury with 12 from this points coming from BIG 5 countries . They only qualified because of the televotes .
Pfff, so what do you think they did with the irregular results and where are the detailes jury votes per each jury member ranking songs from 1 to 17 like every other country? Also why Poland and Romania have the same jury results, and why Azerbaijan and Georgia have the same jury results? Maybe because they are in the same pots!?
Poland and Romania have indeed the same jury score in the second semi, but Azerbaijan and Georgia are different although they are in the same pot. I dont think their votes are dismissed in the semi.
The only difference is that Azerbaijan hasn’t voted for… Azerbaijan. Lol
The rest is completely the same with countries below Azerbaijan going up one place.
I love the background information! It’s very interesting to read about what occurs behind the scenes.
They’ve tried to make all the six countries read the votes they were given by EBU. So, they tried to make it appear that they were doing nothing wrong. How many other countries received the imposed list and just agreed to say the votes?
I hope we get credible explanations/evidence asap to clear this up. No-one likes ‘foul play’ but equally if it turns out a country’s jury was DQd to be replaced by an algorithm, that’s just as bad. EBU, be open and transparent about this. Trust is important, make sure we all know – and if necessary make changes, if not boast about cheat-catching. Either way front up and let everyone know, jmho xx
All I know is that the longer it takes to give the proper explanations, EBU is more suspicious. EBU should do something NOW! And explain everything, with full details
I know few facts from law … The accuser need to come with evidences .
No evidence = no proof
No proof = accusation has no foundation
No foundation = accusation is worthless
Worthless accusation = the accuser is an idiot
Well they have and I’m pretty sure now that the broadcasters wish they haven’t opened their big mouths talking sh*t all these days.
The big mouths that have been opened talking sh*t was EBU! They can’t even explain why they did that. The broadcasters are right.
How can we have the real votes of the 6 jury at the first place plz?
What i think happened here and dont get me wrong , the Romanian jury at least 3 of the members are reputable persons they even represented Romania in the contest … Ovi Jacobsen is not only respected in Romania but in Norway and Swizerland as well , he was even the jury for Swizerland in the last 3 years … they wont risk themself and damage their reputation for a contest where Romania not even qualified for 2-3 years , as well from what i know the jury was not public until late so who would had time to make… Read more »
It is kinda fact that sympathy voting and strategic voting are happening.
Note how the Nordic countries often give high numbers to other nordic countries and east europe also votes for each other.
Romania was voted poorly by the jury in the semi final as well as the grand final. The televotes saved the country
The situation is really getting hilarious and annoying at the same time lo so I think we need to ease down a bit. If someone would put the situation between the involved parties in simple words it would probably look be like this: -EBU: I cancelled some juries because their semifinal results were irregular. -TVR: Oh EBU is so unfair. They cancelled our jury’s final results. Here they are, they look fine. -Fans: EBU, why did you cancel TVR’s final results? They look fine. -EBU:… -Other fans: Oh wait, EBU actally said that they cancelled the juries because their semifinal… Read more »
TVR had a full show tonight with full of accusation on EBU , i mean if you know you cheated you should stfu and try to stop it in silence . Iuliana : “Up to this hour we didnt received any response from EBU , i know are other countries involved and we still wait their answer , it was only one person in Romania who knew the results of the jury vote , the producer who was main responsible for the votes , in the moment when she received another list with other votes from EBU she got alarmed… Read more »
There is another tactic that you use when you know that you are wrong and that that’s called distraction. The more wrong you are the more you shout to shift the attention. Very common in the Balkans hahaha.
And that’s exactly what TVR is doing: they keep talking about the final when the EBU statement is very clear: “certain irregular voting patterns” in the SEMIFINAL. Why TVR isn’t saying a word about the semifinal and keeps shouting about the final? That’s what I call very loud distraction in my Balkan village. 😉
Romania is not in balkan .. you want me to teach you some Geography ?
Balkan Countries ListThe Balkan States are; Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro, Kosovo, Slovenia, Albania, North Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Hungary, Greece and Turkey (the lands are located in European Continent).
https://www.britannica.com/place/Balkans
I’ve read your source’s text mate and it is kind of inconsistent/messy. Geographically speaking, just a very small part of Romania – 4,6% (as Turkey – 3% and Italy – 0.1%) is in the Balkans. Historically speaking, you can say Romania is in the Balkans based on country’s interconnections within this area throughout centuries . However, your source has been amended by others as not so precise though. (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balkans and others).
Mate, geography is one thing and culture another, and the term Balkan has various uses – see the Balkan sprachbund for example. The link from Brittanica was a random source out of thousands you can find online. Most -not all of them- include Romania in the Balkan states. Romania is also member of various “Balkan” organisations. So, yeah Romania is Balkans definitely much more than Hungary is lol
Hungary in Balkans? Oh dear….
aren’t they in the turkis union 🙂 https://www.aa.com.tr/en/analysis/analysis-hungary-in-the-organization-of-turkic-states-a-bridge-between-east-and-west/2424575
Lol…
In Europe you have to prove that someone is guilty…..
My fellow countrymen must have been sent by TVR themselves to defend their bluff or are just doing it through blind patriotism, but I’ve got to tell you, this whole fiasco is not surprising at all when you’re familiar with the kind of shameless, shady BS they try pulling off, this year’s selection process being massive proof of it and that’s just one clear, recent example.
Oh don’t worry, my fellow countrymen (Greeks) would have done the exact same thing, blindly supporting ERT. I think ERT scrapped cancelling their jury by pure luck btw – their votes in their final look very sketchy.
Yeah, the infamous Dream Team connections, lol. At least ERT made an effort to find something really nice to send to the contest this year, TVR can’t even do that!
Regardless, what broadcasters like TVR and ERT (and many others) are doing with their juries is a joke. I don’t expect fans to open their eyes and realise how much this is damaging the reputation of their own countries in Eurovision tbh. For people from the Balkans it’s always someone else’s fault. 😉
I mean is there any proof they cheated?
For Romanian and Moldova it was far deep for it speaks of a dream that could not be spoken before. I saw Romania had 0 points (i am romanian) I could not sleep all night. People just do not understand. We fought centuries with many empires, to be together. For us, it was the sound of beauty.
It would be exactly the same for Greeks and Cypriots, so I do understand (being a Greek). A “12 points” given by a Eurovision jury is not so important though and your people (in both sides of the borders) know that very well.
I’m french so i’m not gonna try to say france was robbed lol. However clearly Spain was robbed of her second place in my opinion…. When you see the final jury votes, those same votes that was changed by EBU was made like this. Four of them have had the exactly same order (again order remade by ebu) Azerbaijan: 12/UK, 10/ITALY, 8/SWEDEN, 7/PORTUGAL, 6/UKRAINE, 5/SPAIN, 4/NETHERLANDS, 3/GREECE, 2/POLAND, 1/FRANCE Georgia: The same order was given by the EBU…. 12/UK, 10/ITALY, 8/SWEDEN, 7/PORTUGAL, 6/UKRAINE, 5/SPAIN, 4/NETHERLANDS, 3/GREECE, 2/POLAND, 1/FRANCE Romania: 12/UKRAINE, 10/SWEDEN, 8/UK, 7/PORTUGAL, 6/AUSTRALIA, 5/SWITZERLAND, 4/ITALY, 3/NETHERLANDS, 2/GREECE, 1/SPAIN Poland:… Read more »
IF you think Eurovision is fair competition you are naive , unsure what is the surprise here.
TVR is not fooling anyone, disclose the 2nd semi jury rankings in full or shut up about it, you corrupt b*stards.
you are corrupt. Romanian are children in comparison to many western nations. We just are not so devious.
I’m Romanian as well, desteapto.
Daca esti prost, baremi nu semnaliza
This needs to be clarified soon. The longer the time it takes to give some public explanations the worse for the credibility of the EBU. I am Spanish and I would haved loved if Chanel would have come second. But I prefer third, where she is, because putting into disrepute the EBU is not good news.
This just seems plain unfair to me and I am confused on why the EBU did this. I wonder if Ukrainian is our real winner? (Seems unlikely but who knows?)
They deserve the win, if the EBU didn’t hack it’s jury results into giving points for Ukraine.
Hope we find out the truth about this situation
You are aware that Ukraine would have won even if she did badly with juries as Norway or Czechia?
Are you aware as well Ukraine could have sent milk advertising and still won it …
Imao but still!
I basically think my entire ESC season has been wasted, and want a reason not to think so.
Yes very aware of what both of you said
Why they deserve to win ???? Because they have the war in their country…that’s why???
Hello this is a contest for music….best musicians, not politicians… i am sory for what is happening there…but each country with their issues …..
The way that the places where before Ukraina and Serbia was the correct classification….
Very disappointed ?
I’m disapointed too, just clarifying that even if we don’t agree it is what it is thats what I meant by “They deserve it” Hope this clarifies
There is by the way an obvious reason why Ukraine got so many Viewer Votes.
The rules are simple.
– 1 number can vote up to 20 times
– A (as an example) German Number can’t vote for Germany (i.e can’t vote for your own country from that country)
Now this is not to diminish any achievements or blame them for this.
But Ukraine had a huge advantage because many Ukrainians are currently scattered across Europe, thus able to actually vote for Ukraine.
It’s been 4 days since the contest. The EBU is dealing with it and investigating and will release their evidence as and when. This is not about us fans and we have no right being impatient and demanding answers from the EBU when the EBU is probably waiting on answers from Azerbaijan etc. I also think people are making a lot of assumptions, namely, that these 6 countries all worked together as a group. Actually, it’s possible there are several different alliances within these 6. For example, San Marino and Poland; Azerbaijan and San Marino and Azerbaijan and Georgia therefore… Read more »
Honestly, I don´t like the fact they are taking so long to give proper explanations. They lose credibility that way. You have to be very sure of what you do if you exclude some countries votes, because that is a very serious decision. If you are that sure you should have the evidence ready to be made public. Otherwise, you risk be acussed of manipulation.
I believe everything was done correctly but I am still in the need of proper explanations.
Since they decided to REPLACE Romanian jury votes with their own votes, it seems to me that the decision was adopted upon some pretty good motives. The Romanian EV team wants to know those motives and why the replacement was only “thrown in face” LIVE on TV, although the results of the Romanian jury votes were already known by EBU 48 hours before the show. This is completely unprofessional and disappointing. What would you say when, for example, the voting elections for EU Parliament were to be “handled” the same way? Huh?
No they didn’t replace anything. They CANCELLED the jury because they identified irregular voting in the SEMIFINAL.
No. They told us huge lies about connection problems (sic) in our faces and they replace in our faces the….”irregular” juries….with ebu regularity. North Korea prevails !
No they didn’t. I didn’t read EBU saying anything about connection problems. They announced that they identified “voting irregularities” in the semifinal results and they cancelled the respective juries. Get your facts right.
Yes, EBU did replacedRomanian’s juring votes And it did say that there are connection issues. I saw the grand final live 😉 so if youre just talking to waste our time do it somewhere else but do not contradict if you didnt even watch the contest!
It was all fixed.
besides the last 2 members which i dont know .. the other 3 are past participants and seriously i found it hard to believe they had anything to do with arranging the votes … Sanda Lado?i, Lumini?a Anghel, Ovi Jacobsen, Liviu Eleke? ?i Mihai Pocorschi
Are we sure EBU didnt changed their votes in semifinal and final for bookmakers ? The competition is already very suspicious and we already have issues … This competition should never be listed for bettings sites just for this reason .
To me it seemed the aggregate scores attributed to the six nations were more suspicious. Strange that the disqualifications and substitute votes csme after the televote had been collated. There is no way those countries would have voted so heavily for the UK. To me it seemed to be about getting the UK into second place – possibly in the hope it will stage for Ukraine next year???
The Rai comentator was horrible and what he said about some songs and especially against Chanel was disgusting.You can have your own pleausures and likes but never insult singers and countries
If you don’t mind me asking what did he say?
Yeah thats quite mean especially on eurovision
Graham Norton does it every year and the dead one before him. Cheap stabs every year that people just brush off as “british humour”.
Only Graham Norton isn’t British, he’s Irish.
Find it hard to believe that the Georgian broadcaster cheated. Judging by what they send every year they are clearly not that interested in getting a good result.
On the news today, they mention the problem was those 6 countries gave 12 points to Cyprus on SF2. EBU found that suspicious. So far only Romania has provided their real jury voting and they would have altered the final outcome. It would be interesting to see the voting of the other juries too. EBU says they are still revising. … OK….
I dont understand why would a country cheat. What is it so important about getting a decent or bad result for a country? Is it just out of national pride? Do countries receive any kind of compensation according to what position do they get at Esc?.
Those countries did not cheat! Eurovision organisers did!
Like Malta didn’t cheat last year?
Just to say that the last Chanel’s press conference took place in Madrid this morning. Obviously the Spanish Delegation was asked about the controversy, they just said it is EBU the one who will give explanations. So apparently they will do so… at some point.
Another mention to the RAI’s conductor who sent an apology video and a bunch of roses to Chanel (he called her cheap J.Lo during the voting time). Well done, everybodyy can make a mistake and acknowledge it and saying sorry is not easy. Not everyone would do that.
He was the worst ever. She should give a bunch of roses to Ronela because he said “i will sue her designer” and two bunches to Moldova guys cause he said “i better take a train to hell than take their train with this music”
How can such disgusting people keep working on national television? He should be fired. This is horrifying
To disrespect someone in this way is not a mistake. It is something you have or dont have inside. And this italian guy, apologies or no apologies has this filth inside.
He dared to make such comments because Ronela and Zdob and Zdub are the representants of two countries, Albania and Moldova, that are constantly facing racisism. Of course, he apologized to Chanel, the representant of Spain. This is so racist and disgusting. Fascism at its worst!
I think he apologized to Spain because RTVE did their job and asked for explanations. Maybe the responsibles of Albania and Moldova televisions should do the same.
The EBU don’t have to provide anything to the public but the Romanian broadcaster hasn’t provided them willingly.
The votes of every country and for every country in the semifinale are public. Romania has also made the rankings public. Maybe it’s time for EBU to give an explanation for what happened. Maybe not to us, but at least to the countries whose votes EBU changed. After 2 days they still don’t have a reaction from EBU. Although I have to admit that we have to show some understanding for EBU. It seems EBU changed partially the votes of more countries besides those 6, so it needs some time to fabric some good explanation…I suppose.
I don’t think I own any clarifying to anyone, but please look into the Romanian media, you will find the document, I’m not going to write everything down myself. 🙂
Stop writing nonsense then. Pfff I’m done with people just complaining without facts or anything
Me? Complaining? I refuse to believe EBU only because of its blue eyes and I would like an explanation from EBU. For the rest I don’t care too much because all I wanted was for Ukraine to win. And that is a fact. So peace! 🙂
I want an explanation from TVR! Love, love, peace, peace! 🙂
There’s no explanation to be had, TVR is an absolute joke and I hope the EBU go after them as hard as possible, no messing about this time.
TVR has already oferred an explanation. You just have to google it. Eurovision is a bad joke a mockery.
Well, there is an official explanation from TVR. You can google for it. It is amazing how Eurovision is taking advantage of some countries and after all this disgusting treatement, those countries are the ones accused of mockery and not EBU. So disrespectful especially that the spokeperson of Romania did all the official rehearsal, she was ready to go live and Eurovision’s official just decide to cut her off the last moment. So unethical, disrespectful and disgusting, an insult not only to TVR, but to the country itself. They should be ashamed!
I’ve googled it, I’ve translated it and I’ve read it. I doesn’t address the main issue which is the semifinal voting. Can TVR provide us of that information to clarify things for good? Thank you
Lol, these are exactly the same for every single juror!
You’re lying. 🙂
I’m just commenting on what Una has mentioned in the above comment. Do you have any different results to show?
Really? Are you accusing a person she is lying when there is an official statement everywhere on the internet with the official results of the Romanian jury? Maybe the other countries did not provide any, but Romania did! Racism at its peak once again.
Are you stupid? Raisa is accusing me of lying not vice versa!! Lol
Yes they did. The rankings are mentioned in the conentaries made on tv. Perhaps not the official ones because no one asked for them
Liar. They did in ROmania. EBU ALSO blocked the romanian show.
https://www.paginademedia.ro/stiri-media/eurovision-note-tari-membri-juriu-20708137
Liar they did
https://www.paginademedia.ro/stiri-media/eurovision-note-tari-membri-juriu-20708137
That’s the final. WHERE IS THE SEMIFINAL RESULTS?
They also hyad a preass release and asome explanations shows. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTPs8q3no1w&t=257s
EBU is pathetic. With this logic, all 12 points given to Ukraine should be deducted because they were given due to the current political situation.
They also rigged even the “public” votes. A lot of people voted out of pity, but EBU obviously contributed.
Oh, and this was the worst organized ESC ever.
Those votes are not about giving points to Ukraine because they would get points back.
In addition, the rule only applies to the jury’s points, not the viewers’.
Nordic countries giving 12 pts to Sweden though…
No they didn’t. Denmark and Norway gave 12 points to Greece and Sweden gave 12 points to Spain.
Maybe because the Greece representative is half Norwegian and lives in Norway since her childhood?
I wish they did
Let’s be real here. What sounds more plausible? That the EBU personally fixed SIX countries votes so that they could purposefully dictate what places 2nd – 5th (because let’s face it, Ukraine was always going to win)… or that there was infact corruption within those country’s jury votes. It might not even be the jurors themselves, it could be their HoD, but somewhere along the line, something majorly fishy happened. The only reason it is more outrageous this time is because there was six countries instead of just one or two. I highly doubt the EBU would seriously risk their… Read more »
Both are plausible.
You do know what countries you are talking about, right, that have presumably “exchanged votes”? Just making sure you have a clear idea about the situation and you’re not jumping on the train “we say they cheated so it’s easy to point the finger”. I think this is the fault of the 3rd party, the one responsible for analysing the votes, who became a little bit too eager. I honestly hope there was no foul play from EBU.
Ye, I think it’s extremely strange for some of those countries involved, and not so much others (without naming names). It’s just using common sense, I think the EBU have more to lose and less to gain by cheating in comparison to a country entering, d’ya get me? It could however be a mess up with the voting partner. I think this is something that needs full transparency, and if it does shame some countries, and the knock on effect is the cost of ‘x’ many countries leaving the contest, then so be it. It’s not ideal, it’s not what… Read more »
“Let’s be real here. What sounds more plausible?” … Such a manipulative introduction mate. You’ve already made your mind before analyzing the facts and your logic is full of … no logic. Did you think a moment that they’re accusing 6 countries of irregularities/rigging vote? Not one, not two, not even four … SIX countries. Did you think a second why Poland and Romania, both of them with years of good reputation in ESC and within EBU, would suddenly start to put their reputation and income benefits from ESC and other European media shows at risk?
That’s rather rude, and extremely presumptuous considering you do not know me personally. All subjective and unfounded. In which sphere is this manipulative? That I would lead with common sense instead of patriotic bias or emotion? I have no allegiance nor disdain to any country (including my own), nor the EBU. I value people, honesty, respect and fairness. Poland & Romania’s jury points in Semi #2 are exactly the same as each other. San Marino & Georgia’s jury points in Semi #2 are exactly the same as each other. With Azerbaijan sharing the exact same Top 6 as the latter… Read more »
That’s extremely presumptuous considering you do not know me personally. All subjective and unfounded. In which sphere is this manipulative? That I would lead with common sense instead of patriotic bias or emotion? I have no allegiance nor disdain to any country (including my own), nor the EBU. I value people, honesty, respect and fairness. My ‘logic’ – Poland & Romania’s jury points in Semi #2 are exactly the same as each other. San Marino & Georgia’s jury points in Semi #2 are exactly the same as each other. With Azerbaijan sharing the exact same Top 6 as the latter… Read more »
Manipulative? That’s extremely presumptuous, rude, subjective and unfounded. I lead with common sense instead of patriotic bias or emotion. I have no allegiance nor disdain to any country (including my own), nor the EBU. I value people, honesty, respect and fairness. My ‘logic’ – Poland & Romania’s jury points in Semi #2 are exactly the same as each other. San Marino & Georgia’s jury points in Semi #2 are exactly the same as each other. With Azerbaijan sharing the exact same Top 6 as the latter two. I have analyzed the facts. I am not privy to what went on… Read more »
Then should we have a rule like Don’t vote with the same points if that country gave you those points? Sorry that is irrational.
If foul play was suspected they should simply not add award the points. I still see no reason why they would do so.
In the name of “honesty, respect and fairness” I will provide you a (not so)short answer: My statement is not “extremely presumptuous, rude, subjective and unfounded”. It is Psychology 101… precisely Behavioral Psychology. There are certain phrases identified as patterns in human actions and behavior and yours “Let’s be real here. What sounds more plausible?” and “[…]d’ya get me?”, say: I know the truth and you (listeners/readers) don’t, so listen to me because I know better. The: “I think the EBU have more to lose and less to gain by cheating in comparison to a country entering,[…]” strongly emphasized by… Read more »
Hypothetical that they choose based on what benefits the EBU and removes false votes when it benefits them.
But these are countries with a history of cheating on jury points
Really? Please explain this history of Romania of cheating on jury points at Eurovision. Because I find this a total lack of respect to throw these accusations without any factual basis.
With this vote of 6 fake juries who collect most points Sweden, UK.
More than 48 hours later and EBU does not clarify anything or provide evidence. This sucks.?
In Spain we had a lot of controversy about Benidorm Fest. But RTVE did what it was needed: calling the press the day after and explaining every single detail about the results. Why EBU don’t do something like this? By not clarifying, they are making the controversy grows bigger and bigger.
There were no irregularities in Spain. Those who moaned obviously didn’t look up the rules that were published months in advance. All the contestants knew what they were signing up for.
It was also just one country so you can’t really compare the situation.
I think you actually can. Apparently, this was also at Eurovisions’ rules, also published months in advance. Nothing to fear from their side if this is so. But they need to explain it publicly.
New updates coming fresh from the Romanian Broadcaster TV news – in the Grand Final it seems EBU had sent the changed jury scores to more than 6 broadcasters. Some of them accepted to announce the EBU scores and “went live”. Those who refused suddenly experienced “technical difficulties”. NO Comment EBU, other than rage. I am glad Ukraine won and it was an emotional moment coming together to vote and show support, but it was tinted by such shenanigans.
What do you mean to more than 6 broadcasters? Were more initially accused of cheating?
EBU changed the jury votes of more countries than those 6. The Polish jury has also confirmed this.
I find Serbia’s jury member C a bit suspicious. That jury member ranked top 5 of Eurovision 2022 to 20-24.
Romanian and Polish broadcasters are simply salty caught cheating
They were in shock when they have been announced last moment about some invented results by EBU. The Romanian spokeperson was not even allowed to go live, she was cut off. You should be ashamed of your obviously racists comments. In 2022, you should know better, but the fascism is still alive obviously.
Sorry I must have missed something, what “racist” comment did Aruela make
the reply is for Ugnius, thats what you have missed
I’m not a fan of Eurovision. But this “scandal” caught my attention. I don’t know anything about Polish broadcaster. I’m Romanian myself and I don’t understand why it can be a problem that Romanian jury gave 12 points to Moldova. But because of some “tehnical issues”, these 12 points went to Ukraine.
Also, I dare to ask you why do you think just Polish and Romanian broadcasters “are simplu salty caught cheating”?? If EBU noticed an attempt of cheating from Azerbaijan, Georgia, San Marino etc, too!
Eurovision and corruption: It has always being going on with juries and everybody knows about it especially the Ebu and the fans although they’d like to pretend otherwise especially in regards with their own country. Fans will accuse any other country for doing it except their own. This years problem wasn’t the usual exchange of 12 points. That can be somewhat explained by other conditions and the Ebu turns a blind eye cause it cant be attributed to an agreement. Six countries in the 2nd semi collaborated and voted all the other 5 in their top 5 positions and deliberately… Read more »
By that logic no one can vote for the same songs, even if they’re good. Everything you just said is flawed, and EBU is pathetic for doing this secretly.
They literally cannot prove why someone voted for someone. They’re just being hypocritical because they don’t like the votes.
Let’s just deduct all 12 and 10 points given to Ukraine, because those were obviously given due to the current situation there.
Very plausible.
It doesn’t sound right because in Semi final 2 Romania gave Sweden their highest points and I seriously doubt Sweden would have to bribe any jurors as they usually get good scores regardless. Secondly Romania gave Poland 0 points in the semi final, if those two had an agreement it would have been a really lousy one for Poland.
@Camilla: I think you’re talking about the artificial points, not the rigged ones. Poland really didn’t need to get involved in this, but maybe they were building relationships for the next year.
Honestly…Moldova fairly deserved their top points…not ZERO. This recalculated score is so unfair…I saw the full jury vote and honestly everything looked predictable? The only thing was that Sweden was very low (can happen) and Azerbaijan was 5th (a jury bait song so i think 5th is not that crazy…)
I hope they again recalculate the final score…because Spain came 2nd…and this year the 2nd place is going to be remember as the “”real winner””
Agree. I don’t understand this. So Romania did something bad at the SF, but the country being prejudiced from EBU’s solution is Moldova?
Sorry, but I truly believe that they should look for another way to counter fraud, like economic sanctions.
no, Ukraine is the real winner and will be remembered that way. Still, I think Spain should be in 2nd which is very good too.
They’ll be remembered as a political winner, yet again. lol
Ukraine is the winner. Full stop. Let me give you a comparison. When going to a restaurant, your perceived satisfaction does not only depend on the food and it’s ingredients…plating, service, ambiance, seating, etc.. all contribute to your experience. Same here. Personal preferences are complex. Public voting decisions are based on a combination of many factors, including the geo political situation. And what’s better on having a meaningful and symbolic song with such a real impact on peoples life…in other words, Stefania is a legitimate and perfect winner.
Everyone is splitting hairs. You know what I mean. There are many people will view the 2nd place as this years winner (including me)
This is not what the EBU Supervisor Mr. Martin said. He clearly announced that night:”connection problems”.
So, they knew it is not a connection problem and knowingly lied all these millions of viewers around the globe to believe it is a connection problem.
If these are not romanian jury votes, then whose points are they?
No, he said nothing like that. Just the hosts said something in that sense. Regarding Azerbaijan, he said “…we seem to have a problem there.” And then announced the points. It seems that the points are basically this years’ average, adjusted slightly following long-term patterns.
No, this maybe happened to Azerbaijan, but the Romanian spokeperson was clearly cut off, because of “connections issues”. She has posted the live video with her reaction on her instagram, she was in shock.
Mika is in que, prompted to talk with Romania spokewoman, but suddenly Martin intervene and cut the connection, watch the video again, Mika almost arise an argument with Martin. Shame
Guys the problem was with the semi final voting.
The fact that you’re being downvoted for mentioning the facts is a new low for Wiwibloggs. Honestly the level of stupidity in here is similar to the one you’d find in antivaxxer fora.
It was both I think because the while issue with Romania being suspected is because they gave Poland 0 points in the semi final but 8 in the final. But seriously aten’t juries allowed to change their mind if someone do and extra good job in the final?
Now, this is a good point. I liked the Czech performance in the SF & voted for them. But in the GF their performance was very shrill & I voted for other countries. Was I supposed to still vote for them?
Yes, you were.(Just kidding btw)
How do you know this since the semi final votes aren’t published. The only semi final votes we have are the aggregated results so not the supposed rigged ones
Everyone was trusting the EBU up until these broadcasters speaking. Come on guys, OF COURSE they’re going to deny it! When have any broadcasters or jurors admitted to fudging their rankings before?! I still trust the EBU on this and believe that they believe they detected inconsistencies. As almost everyone has said, most of these countries have clearly been guilty of this before and we should be glad that Osterdahl is doing something about it.
No, Something smell fishy inside the board. Have you heard that EBU sucks RAI before the contest began? Only intellectual people can think of it. Manipulation and massive action for their unwanted plans, everything is different what they are agreed upon and ackward procedure to the setup. Releasing a statement a possible hackers attack on EBU web. Italy is well competent when it comes web hackering and detected before infiltrate. Have you ask also, why all RAI own production number perfectly shown like “FAI RUMORE, MIKA ACT, IL VOLO, LAURA MEDLEY, memorable opening of GF and both opening of SF.… Read more »
I’ve never read so many words in my own language without understanding a single thing before in my life.
Ukraine will win every ESC the next 5 to 10 years as their spread out expats will vote for the home country. That is a fact of ESC, countries with large number of guest workers/visitors vote for their country of origin.
That’s why Turkey always got high points from Germany. Applies to all, just look who works or studies in which country and you know who gets the points.
Everyone is getting distracted by the jury vote where the real cheating lies in the televote. No way Ukraine got 12 points from 38 out of 40 countries. There’s no way. Even for a pity vote. Televote is easy to manipulate because no one will ever see the true results. This is scary because EBU can determine who they want to win in the future.
It is much easier to cheat with the jury groups as the jury’s points are based on people that the TV companies appoint to their own country.
The telephone voting is based on the random people who text / telephone and the result is not the responsibility of the TV company
It is true that the TV viewers can not control whether the other voting people, voted like that, but the result, counting the votes, the TV company has no responsibility over
Yesterday I thought that the “irregularities” detected by EBU were real even though I already thought that making up a new scoreboard for the affected countries was arbitrary.
Now I think it’s just pure corruption and rigging given that the affected broadcasters are speaking up and that we can see that their actual votes made more sense while EBU isn’t saying a word at all, which is sad and outrageous
In case of Romania, it seems natural to me they would give their 12 points to Moldova… especially because moldovian song sang about their friendly relations….
It’s more than just “friendly relations”. Moldova and Romania used to be the same country until it was forcefully annexed by Stalin’s Soviet Union, and the song is about the deep connection we share so, there’s that
I agree. And based on that, how about Greek and Cypriot juries awarding 12 points to each other EVERY YEAR? Isn’t that irregular?
Actually, the Cypriot juries placed Greece third (8 points) in 2022. In 2021, Cyprus had Greece 1st (12p) while Greece had Cyprus 2nd (10p). In 2019 they did exchange the 12 points. In 2018 the Greek jury had Cyprus 2nd (10p) In 2017 Cyprus had Greece 2nd (10p) while Greece had Cyprus 3rd (8p).
Also, just like Romania and Moldova were the same countries until the Soviet Union split them, Greece and Cyprus are the same nation. We have the same TV and music industry; hell, we even have the same national anthem.
No this does not happen every year…be careful other time dear.
I think EBU should do it the other way around. Let the spokespersons give their televote points and get a jury of international people evaluate the songs.
I can’t believe the Romanian jury was giving Moldova 12 points cos of quality song and honestly Scandinavia, Balkans and Baltic blocks have been doing the same exchange of top votes between them for decades, so not exactly that objective either
It’s funny how block voting become a problem only when Eastern countries joined the contest and outnumbered the Western ones.
Ireland and The UK used to exchange points all the time before 2009 Portugal and Spain, Greece and Cypress, Scandinavians amongst themselves as well and nobody made an issue of that for 50 editions of the contest.
If you check your facts. There are serious pattern studies made on Eurovision. The nordics are not voting to each other in the way as the eastern European countries that vote to each other whatever song they sent. That is not the case in the Northern Europe. That us is a fact. The Eastern Europe is the most biased . Both the juries and the public in the eastern part of Europe vote for each other more than others.
This is what one of the articles says: “ As a closing note, I think it is worth mentioning that the judge voting appears to have less bias. It is far from perfect, but it is reassuring that the professionals are more objective than the public.” Taken from https://towardsdatascience.com/identifying-voting-blocs-in-the-eurovision-song-contest-4792065fc337. So if we would go to 100 % televoting some countries would never win.
People from similar countries have similar taste in music. I don’t see how that’s wrong.
Most people in Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro and Macedonia listen to literally the same songs.
Same is obvious in some other regions.
Just let people vote, don’t meddle.
No then the contest would die, because Some countries will have zero possibility to win and withdraw. That was about to happen when there was 100% televotes. The song competition became a circus with block voting from the east. Some westerner countries wanted to withdraw. They had to reintroduce the juries to balance.
you should check also ROmania and Moldova, they did not gave each other max points. Romania only in other 2 years gave Moldova max points.
Agree if any international jury group or jury members per country are appointed by the EBU.
There are advantages to a jury, but extensive cheating has taken place, for example in 2013.
Or probably in 2011. For example, it is obvious that San marino and many others had a pact in semifinal 1.
San marino gave points to countries in principle which then gave back points to them and with each other.
and btw …United kingdom would return back for 10 years on the bottom of the ranking , if Sweden would have sent this song at ESC they would have definetly won it … ESC most corrupted contest ever .
I hate to say that, but now I understand better why Turkey withdrew from the competition after 2012. Everything about to contest is just political..
I am sure that they knew the irregularities in the jury voting but they never explained it because the country that “committed” this irregularity most clearly was their “brother country” ouch..
Reality check.
Turkey withdrew because of Erdogan politics.
That is also why Italy withdrew from the competition for a good number of years as well.
We all know who really won Eurovision 2022 United Kingdom ??
You can’t say who would’ve got the points that Ukraine got. It could be also Spain, since the points difference between UK and Spain was not that big.
Get rid of Jury in semi finals
Check above some countries would suffer from that. The public is more biased. Maybe the semifinals should be decided according to voting patterns. All the east in one semifinal and the west in another.
…but that would be against the nr. 1 purpose of this contest: to build bridges between countries who have no connections. It’s better like this: to mix east & west & then make sure they vote for the most deserving songs.
Why don’t Jury vote some time in one big final
Because the EBU needs to make sure the “right” song wins & the “right” songs reach TOP 5 & the “right” songs reach TOP10.
I don’t know what went on this year, I don’t know why Romania is publicly complaining that their jury vote was “corrected”. But I am pretty sure it wasn’t just this year that the EBU “corrected” the jury votes of some countries, all the countries?, the weakest link countries?
What a fix EBU
Why pretend on the night that this was down to ‘technical difficulties’? And why was Österdahl wearing headphones for the first announcement? Surely he already knew he was about to appear on camera. I hope we get the rest of the story.
I saw on twitter that Azerbaijan might be withdraw from 2023 contest after all the scandals
Noooooo! I want EBU to get rid of them before they “withdraw” lol
I would be so glad if Romania withdraws from this mockery. Enough with these racists comments, it is 2022, get yourself educated.
Azerbaijan won’t withdraw.
It seems Romania to withdraw from 2023. The jury was Ovi(who is half norvegian) from Esc 2010 when he finished 3rd, Luminita Anghel who also finished 3rd, Ladosi from esc 2006 so they are very respectable and fair jurors. This was nothing to do with their corruption. The norvegian EBU director didnt like the jurrors vote so he punished these countries. As a Eurovision fan for me this was a really wake up call. This contest was far from fair. I get that Ukraine had to win.It was a good song but not the best by far. If this is… Read more »
The only thing I’ll miss if we actually withdraw is being able to vote for the few countries that bother sending decent stuff to the contest, we hardly ever do that, it’s usually novelty and kitsch all the way as far as we’re concerned (Cezar, Paula and Ovi 2014, Ovidiu Anton, the yodel-rap mishmash, WRS and so on…).
Obviously, their jury does not vote freely.
For example, look at how their jury voted in 2014, very extremely equal for all members
Okay but you have the votes of jury in second semifinal on official site …. so Romania jury gave 12 points to Sweden , 10 points to Australia , 8 points to Czech Republic , 7 points to Estonia , 6 points to Belgium , 5 points to Macedonia , 4 points to Finland , 3 points to Azjerbadjan , 2 points to San Marino and 1 point to Israel … sorry but i dont see any pattern in this . In finale they voted 12 to Moldova (which was not in second semifinal and 10 points to Greece which… Read more »
No, that’s the aggregate replacement jury vote. There’s no detailed breakdown per each member of jury in the Semi-Final results of these 6 countries, when there is one for every other country. Also Poland which is in the same pot with Romania has the exact same jury results in Semi 2 – they are both the aggregate jury votes from their pot.
Is nowhere saying anything about aggregate replacement votes in semifinales … because that would have changed maybe the entire qualification table .. as well Romania only had 18 points from jury with 12 from this points coming from BIG 5 countries . They only qualified because of the televotes .
Pfff, so what do you think they did with the irregular results and where are the detailes jury votes per each jury member ranking songs from 1 to 17 like every other country? Also why Poland and Romania have the same jury results, and why Azerbaijan and Georgia have the same jury results? Maybe because they are in the same pots!?
Poland and Romania have indeed the same jury score in the second semi, but Azerbaijan and Georgia are different although they are in the same pot. I dont think their votes are dismissed in the semi.
The only difference is that Azerbaijan hasn’t voted for… Azerbaijan. Lol
The rest is completely the same with countries below Azerbaijan going up one place.
Spot on! Now i wonder, if we wouldve had different 10 qualifiers with the eliminated votes.
Can’t juries change their minds too? Maybe they weren’t that impressed with Poland in the semi but were won over in the final…that actually happens.
You just know Azerbaijan is behind this. That broadcaster has been trouble since the day they joined the contest!
Azerbaijan and cheating are synonymous in ESC dictionary, aren’t they? :p
and Ebu….infront
I really don’t understand how did this topic become a “west” vs “east” discussion? This isn’t the spirit of Eurovision. Please stop it!!
Let’s make it North vs South…