Melovin won “Vidbir”, Ukraine’s national selection for the Eurovision Song Contest back on the 24th of February with his song “Under The Ladder”. Now a couple of weeks later, his participation in the 2018 Eurovision in Lisbon might be a big question, as UA:PBC, Ukraine’s national broadcaster could shut down by the end of April!
UA:PBC celebrated one year of existance earlier this year, but they are already facing a complete shut down. Managers of the Ukrainian broadcaster spoke at a Council of Europe conference in Kiev last week, and they stressed the urgency of finding adequate funding for the broadcaster which has been functioning with only half the budget prescribed by Ukrainian law.
Head of Member Relations, CEE, Radka Betcheva stated:
We are extremely concerned that the lack of sustainable funding for UA:PBC will stifle the growth and development of this important democratic institution and is threatening its very existence at the current time. This may jeopardise Ukraine’s EU accession talks and endanger further EU financial help moving forward.
UA:PBC needs to find an urgent short term solution to ensure it can continue to function, because otherwise they might be forced to shut down completely by the end of April, which is before the 2018 Eurovision Song Contest is going to be taking place. Should this happen, Melovin might not be allowed to take part in the Contest.
