Turkey: TRT speaks of no plans to return in Eurovision due to Conchita and the voting system
After numerous ongoing discussions and arguments among the fans on a possible Turkish return in the Eurovision Song Contest , it was time for the Turkish broadcaster to speak out and clear its intentions.
The General Director of TRT Ibrahim Eren was a guest of a conference in one of Istanbul’s universities. Answering to a question that had to do with Turkey’s future plans in the Eurovision Song Contest the TRT official stated:
“There are no plans for returning yet. There are reasons for this, as the voting system. As a public broadcaster, we can’t broadcast a show where there is a bearded woman, skirt wearing,non-gender declared winner who says “I’m a woman and a man” at 21:00 when there are children watching it. I told directly EBU that they have drawn themselves away from their values. Other countries also decided not to participate because of this. There is a mind confusion due to the organizers. If there is a change on this we will return.”
These statements clear out that Turkey has no intention of making a comeback in the contest as long as the Big 5 voting system remains the same and the LGTB community continues receiving such wide support within the competition.
The Eurovision Story So Far
Turkey debuted in the Eurovision Song Contest back in 1975. The country last participated in the contest in Baku in 2012 with Can Bonomo who achieved a 7th placing with his entry Love me back. Turkey was crowned winner in 2003 with the entry Every way that i can performed by Sertab Erener after a breathtaking voting , leaving Belgium 2 points behind. Turkey’s other top five results are Athena (2004) with the song For Real , Kenan Doğulu (2007) and his entry Shake it up Shekrim, Hadise (2009) and her dynamic song Düm Tek Tek, who all finished fourth, and the new metal band MaNga (2010), who finished second with their song We could be the same.
Lets remember some of Turkey’s remarkable past entries in the Eurovision Song Contest :
