Our View: No significance to be read into Eurovision

An ongoing joke at the Eurovision Song Contest was that when marks were given out by each country, it was a near certainty that Cyprus would give Greece’s song ‘douze points’ and Greece would reciprocate. There may have been times when the top points were not given but most of the times they were.

In Saturday’s contest, held in Liverpool, the Greek song had not made it to the final but Greece still voted and committed a grave error – it gave the Cyprus entry, sung by Andrew Lambrou, a meagre four points. This sparked a wave of reaction on social media, the main comment on Twitter being ‘shame,’ many seeing this as a national betrayal. Others read great political significance into it.

Former justice minister, Emily Yiolitis tweeted her disappointment, saying: “The total absence of any mention to Cyprus in the Greek (election) debate from all the political chiefs without exception, did not prepare anyone as much as the ‘four’ in Eurovision, that for the mother country Cyprus lies far away.” So when Greece was giving the Cyprus entry ‘douze points’ was this an indication that it was closer to the mother country?

The implications of the low score, was also taken up by the former foreign minister of Greece, Nikos Kotzias, who attempted to analyse the symbolic significance of the low score. “The ‘four’ to Cyprus at Eurovision is not the problem, but the result, another indication of the effort made by many sides of the dominant system to alienate Greek society from the island and the Cyprus issue, so they can push their rejectable plans,” wrote Kotzias, who also happens to be an academic.

What epistemological method has Kotzias employed to come up with this explanation? Is his conclusion the product of academic research or is he using the Eurovision scoring to make a cheap political point, inventing political significance in a song contest that has none? Are we, seriously, to believe that the low score given to Cyprus on Saturday stemmed from efforts to drive a wedge between Greece and Cyprus, so that an unacceptable settlement is imposed in Cyprus?

As for Yiolitis’ Eurovision-linked complaint, that there was no mention of Cyprus in Greece’s election debate, it is difficult to understand why there should have been. Greek voters have much more important issues they would want addressed in an election debate than Cyprus. The Cyprus problem was not an issue in the Cyprus presidential elections so why should it be one in Greece? Why would Greek voters be interested in it when the Greek Cypriot voters, whose daily lives are affected by it, were not?

The four points had no significance other than that the Greek committee did not find the Cyprus entry worthy of a higher mark and did not feel obliged to follow the ‘douze points’ tradition.