Belarus – In a dramatic day in Belarus, the President has announced that vote rigging occurred in their recent national final. He personally stepped in and has declared that the votes for Alyona Lanskaya were not correct. Instead the second place act, Litesound, will go to Baku as the country’s representative instead.President Alexander Lukashenko said via a statement “(it) was unfortunate that it had to be decided on the presidential level, but this was a matter of justice and it was his duty to stand up for justice”.
It is not yet know whether Litesound will perform their song “We are the Heroes“. More information will be announced shortly.
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Interesting – isn’t there some sort of Eurovision rule about political interference or is that just about songs being non-political? Can’t imagine it going down too well in the UK if David Cameron (our PM) picked our entry but then again he probably couldn’t do any worse than the selections we’ve had since Katrina and The Waves won
Imaani was fantastic in 1998.
Agreed!
Imaani was excellent, I’m not surprised she picked up points from each participating country
it was the best of the nf and litesound had been robbed so much in the past: it’s a relief that it would go to eurovision instead, but why? there’s a NF, everyone watched it, and we had a winner, what changed? why? the suspision and conspiracies theories will be huge and disappointing that Litesound’s participation will always be under that shadow… still my new 6th
It’s a shame what happened in Belarus’s NF, but now i’m happy that Litesound which were by far the best, will represent them in Baku. Belarus is now my new 2nd place.
Indeed it is. My first reaction was to disqualify Belarus from my list, but I am waiting for some kind of explanation. It’s hard to understand why they can’t organize a simple NF without corrupted officials being involved. Corruption seems to be woven into every aspect of daily life. Oh well, I think I’ll have to wait sitting down, otherwise I may get tired.
Waiting for Godot maybe?
Probably.
This is what i heard that happened there :
Litesound was 2 thousand televotes in front of Lanskaya.
After counting the votes of jury, producer of Eurofest Dmitry Baranov, who was also member of jury (and now declared main responsible person in rigging scandal) has approached the counting team and instructed to fake result and announce Lanskaya as televoting winner. He also instructed the real results to be deleted. The computer hard disc with them was destroyed, but the investigation team has managed to recover them.
It was also announced that total cost of organization of the final was around 400 000 euros, guest acts have been paid around 50 000 euros each.
President also ordered to make official appology to Alyona Lanskaya from his name. “She is not the one to blame. She is absolutely innocent in this case”.
President had proposed two options – to declare Litesound winners or to rerun the final, but it was quickly decided to choose first variant.
Thanks, Razvan. If only Mr. President acted the same way when it comes to different (and more important) situations.
The president himself made a statement regarding their entry in the Eurovision Song Contest? (do i get this right?). I guess they’ve solved every other problem in their country :p . Seriously, is this for real?
I will boycott them…I’m sure they are cheating now… and they will stay in semi once again..
I hope Gaitana will stay for Ukraine!
Austrian NF has great stage and almost all performances are good…I’m watching now.
I’m also watching, it’s an AMAZING NF
I missed somehow 3punkt5 – “Augenblick”, did you watch when they performed? I’m interested if they kept part in Croatian language they have in studio version..
I would love to see Valerie, DelaDap!, Norbert Schneider, Papermoon, the Mary Broadcast Band and Trackshittaz for Austria… it’s a very strong final…
as German, I tend to mistrust the Austrians a bit
and I really fear they will go for Conchita Wurst… 3.5 would also be terrible in my opinion – not that I don’t like this style of music, but this song is a bit empty and characterless…
my horror scenario would be Conchita vs. 3.5 in the final…
@ Morgan
AMAZING? A? You are already prepared for Danny in the Globen! AMAZING?
OMG I saw 3punkt5 on recap!! I want them in Baku!! And they kept part in Croatian language! Which is the same as Serbian of course
Who will decide between these two, televoting? BOOOOOOOO Conchita!!
100 % televoting
okay, now it’s Trackshittaz all the way for me…!
I double-cross my fingers that it won’t be Conchita…
the guests of the show are influencing terribly for Conchita…
YAY, Thanks God!
I really like their performance more than song, and it will be even better on the bigger stage in Baku, I give them 9,5/10! Bravo!
YAAAAAAAAAAYYYY
…
I love Austria!
they won with 51 % of the votes… !
Oh my, I have just returned home to learn that the Austrians sent the two worst acts on offer to the superfinal … as for the winning act: tragic and pathetic! 1/12 … even worse than Gaitana and last place on my list!
Interview with them from Eurovision’s official youtube channel
Good Luck to Litesound. “We Are The Heroes” is in my Top 5.
Heh, so that’s how they do things in Belarus – anything can be changed by the president’s will. Nevertheless, can’t say I disagrre, Litesound was far better
I do not mind. Both songs are pretty average.
Please, have a look at this video by Litesound:
It’s from the final, not semi-final, and has better sound quality and different stage look.
I’m from Belarus and I’m very happy that Litesound will represent my country this year!
In my opinion, it’s our best entry so far.