Given that Easter Sunday is a holy and significant day for Orthodox Christians, ERT, RIK, and perhaps other public broadcasters from Orthodox countries have complained about the schedule of the rehearsals and the Red Carpet event.
Earlier this morning, the 37 public broadcasters received the preview programming from the EBU. According to our exclusive information, ERT and RIK expressed dissatisfaction, stating that they had hoped the EBU would be more accommodating with all of the original programming and would not have scheduled this year’s event so that the rehearsals would coincide with the Orthodox Easter week. Most importantly, they requested not to participate in the Red Carpet event on Sunday, May 5, which is also Easter Sunday for all Orthodox Christians. As a result, two more delegations will be missing from the event, following Israel, which will also not be there because that day is dedicated to the memory of the Holocaust.
On this significant day for all Greeks, the Greek and Cypriot delegations will attend the resurrection ceremony at St. Andrew’s Cathedral in Malmö. Marina Satti and Silia Kapsis will be with the city’s Greek community on Easter Sunday, commemorating the holy day in a customary Greek manner. ERT and RIK decided to pay tribute in this way to what is arguably the most sacred period of the year for Orthodox Christians because they believed that having the two performers on the Red Carpet on such a day would be disrespectful to the church.
There have been previous instances of something similar occurring. Polina, whose song “Waggon” was chosen to represent Greece in the 1986 Eurovision Song Contest, withdrew from the competition due to the objections of the Greek church, as the competition had been scheduled to take place during Orthodox Easter.
While the Orthodox countries of Serbia and Ukraine are heading in the same direction as Greece and Cyprus, Moldova will be participating in the Red Carpet despite the anticipated backlash from the local church.