At Eurovision Song Contest 2022, Romania’s votes were stolen. What’s the reason? Politics appears to be the obvious cause. Would the Ukrainians win the Eurovision Song Contest regardless of their performance? Here are the confessions of Eda Marcus, who had to present the Romanian scores to the participating countries live at Eurovision.
Ukraine won the Eurovision 2022, but the event was marred by a scandal. Because the invasion of Ukraine and the entire military escalation in the region drew global attention and elicited millions of political or philanthropic responses, Ukraine was expected to be favoured.
It comes as no surprise that Eurovision is about politics rather than music. Everyone is aware of it, but no one is speaking out about Eurovision’s irregularities.
According to Valahai News, Romania had technical problems on the evening when the score was to be broadcasted, a few minutes before the live broadcast of the presenter of the Romanian station that broadcast Eurovision, Eda Marcus.
When Mika declares that Romania is experiencing „technical difficulties,” the following occurs:
The video above is a recording of Eda Marcus, the presenter who was forced to live-stream Romania’s points. Her expression says it all. She couldn’t believe what was happening, especially so close to the broadcast.
The Romanian host also discussed what happened behind the scenes
According to TVR (Romanian television), presenter Eda Marcus was not permitted to broadcast live the results of the Romanian judging by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU). The Romanian jury’s vote was overturned by the EBU.
It should be noted that the Eurovision show is taped one night before the broadcast in order to avoid unforeseen circumstances that could jeopardize the broadcast. The judging, on the other hand, is live-streamed. The jury, appointed by Romanian television to judge the artistic moments, met and voted on Friday evening. The procedure is typical. Before the organizers have the score, it is uploaded to a platform. In the case of Romania, the jury awarded Moldova maximum points, implying that the 12 points were assigned to Moldova rather than Ukraine.
The scores are uploaded to an online platform, they are processed on the evening of the show and a few minutes before I go live, the EBU practically takes out of that platform where these notes were introduced by my colleagues, a sheet that I have to show in the presence of a notary. This sheet is printed and brought to me in 5 minutes. (…) Imagine the shock of my colleague, Diana Damian, who took care of this procedure, when she handed me with that sheet, knowing what was the ranking she had given the night before when she looked at the sheet and saw 12 points for Ukraine.
Eda Marcu, presenter on Romanian television
EBU has been notified in advance of this mistake. According to the Romanian television presenter, EBU communicated something evasive.
We were told to do it as written, that they are EBU and that they will clarify the situation. That’s how I ended up with the 12-point sheet for Ukraine and couldn’t broadcast live anymore.
Eda Marcu, presenter on Romanian television
What were Romania’s actual scores at EUROVISION?
The total scores offered by Romania were the following: Moldova – 12 points, Grece – 10 points, Poland – 8 points, Netherlands – 7 points, Azerbaijan – 6 points, Australia – 5 points, Italy – 4 points, Spain – 3 points, Finland – 2 points, Lithuania – 1 point.
Despite reports that Romania had technical issues, it was announced after the contest that the jury from Romania and other countries had been disqualified. The juries of six nations competing in the second EUROVISION 2022 semi-final, according to the EBU, have been disqualified due to irregularities. Instead, a replacement aggregate result was introduced for each country for both the second semi-final and the grand final (calculated based on the results of other countries with a similar voting history). Azerbaijan, Georgia, Montenegro, Poland, Romania, and San Marino were among the six disqualified national juries.
Some believe that the situation with Ukraine has deteriorated and that it has gone too far. Others argue that if the Ukrainians were already certain to win the Eurovision contest, why did they hide it? One thing is certain. Eurovision has always been a political game, with a lot of money and interest in the middle hidden behind a veil of empathy, much like this year. To avoid becoming a victim of such a game, Romania should withdraw from the competition permanently, as should many other countries.
