This Tuesday June 24th, the president of RTVE Corporation, Luis Fernández, will explain the process that led Rodolfo Chikilicuatre to represent Spain last May in Belgrade at the Spanish Parliament. This comes after a query registered by a member of the conservative People's Party.

The selection process used by TVE to choose the Spanish representative for Belgrade 2008 was strongly supported by the public broadcaster. After some controversy surrounding the previous online voting via MySpace and the results of the National Final on March 8th, when Rodolfo Chikilicuatre won the right to represent Spain at the 2008 Eurovision Song Contest, TVE's programming director Eva Cebrián stated that Rodolfo enjoyed full support from the broadcaster "to the furthest consequences".

Now, opposition group People's Party (conservative) demands an explanation. Its member Ms María del Carmen Álvarez Cisneros registered a petition days ago in order to request Fernández's presence this Tuesday in the Chamber to explain all the procedure followed by TVE, wich in the end brought Rodolfo Chikilicuatre to Belgrade.

UPDATE

Luis Fernández attended the Spanish Parliament this morning. The president of RTVE defended the "open and democratic" procedure that the public broadcaster used to choose the 2008 representative for Eurovision. According to Mr Fernández, the MySpace selection process "respected all the legal warranties, and as a proof of its validity, other European countries such as Germany, Ireland, Norway and Turkey are going to implement it" in their national selections for Eurovision.

Opposition party PP answered Mr Fernández complaining about the "ridiculous" performance of Rodolfo Chikilicuatre and the embarrassment for Spanish people. The conservative and leading opposition group in the Spanish Parliament also accused Mr Fernández and RTVE of "preventing many young hopeful people from representing their country and being watched by millions of viewers".