Back on August 8th, esctoday.com reported that Spain would be withdrawing from the 2007 Junior Eurovision Song Contest after the new TVE Director, Javier Pons, claimed that the “Junior Eurovision promotes stereotypes we do not share”. Today, esctoday.com has learned that there has been no official withdrawal lodged with the EBU.
esctoday.com's partner website Belgovision.com yesterday reported that Sipke Jan Bousema the host of the next Junior Eurovision Song Contest, NOS of the Netherlands wanted Spain to return. "Spain is a big European country and it is very important that they take part".
The reason given by the incoming director of TVE for his desire to remove Spain from the competition relates to the ethics of children performing songs with adult implications such as love songs, and costumes such as mini skirts. Spain in fact entered a song sung by a nine year old girl in a mini-dress singing Antes muerta que sencilla (I'd rather be dead than simple). The song won votes from across Europe and won the competition in 2004.
esctoday.com has contacted the EBU and TVE to seek clarification on the situation. Today, we were told by Svante Stockselius that: "we have not yet received any official withdrawal from TVE Spain. We will of course talk to them, if they insist we might give the open space to someone else. Or run the show with 17 countries".
Should TVE follow through on the director's comments and officially withdraw from the 2007 Junior Eurovision Song Contest, they would still be liable to pay the participation fee because the deadline for withdrawal passed several weeks ago.
Weasked Mr. Stockseliusabout what potential changes could be made to the competition to bring back the Big Four Countries. The loss of the United Kingdom, France, Spain and the continued absence of Germany means increasing costs for the remaining participating countries. There is a risk that this will price potential entrants out of the show due to financial reasons. Mr. Stockselius explains: "Their reasons for not taking part this year can be very different (budget problems, scheduling problems etc) but we are having a good and constructive communication. We also raised the interest from 15 participants last year to 19 applicants this year".
The fifth annual Junior Eurovision Song Contest takes place in Rotterdam, Netherlands on December 8.
