RTBF, broadcaster of the French speaking community in Belgium, has postponed the song submission deadline to 3rd January 2005. In a system of taking turns, RTBF is responisble for next year's Belgian Eurovision Song Contest entry, after Flemish broadcaster VRT sent Xandee to Istanbul.

RTBF has decided to postpone the song submission deadline for the 2005 Eurovision Song Contest and awaits an announcement for the open competition to be published in the member magazine of SABAM, the Belgian Society of Authors, Composers and Publishers. The magazine will be published on 17th December, two days after the initial deadline.

“This magazine reaches many members and so RTBF thought it was worth postponing the deadline till the 3rd of January to give the opportunity to more artists to submit their songs.” explains Leslie Cable, responsible for Eurovision matters at RTBF, to esctoday.com. In the advertisement RTBF will make an appeal to established Belgian artists to submit songs to the Belgian Eurovision Song Contest selections, mainly in French.

Songs should now be submitted to the RTBF Eurovision headquarters in Liège before Monday 3rd January 2005. The artists as well as the composers should have the Belgian nationality or be a resident in Belgium for at least 3 years.

At the end of January 2005, RTBF will decide in which way the Belgian song for the Eurovision Song Contest 2005 will be selected.