Slovakia will not be present at the 2025 Eurovision Song Contest.
Despite an initial interest in returning to Eurovision next year, it has now been confirmed that Slovakia will not be present at next years Eurovision Song Contest, with the main reason being cited as financial. Despite the Slovakian broadcaster having more funding available, CEO Ľuboš Machaj claims it will still not be enough for the broadcaster to reach its strategic goals.
Head of the RTVS Communications Department, Zuzana Vicelová, has revealed the reasons the broadcaster has decided to not include the Eurovision Song Contest in its broadcasting schedules is mainly down to finances and viewership.
“Due to the reduced amount of the contribution from the state budget for RTVS, which was decided at the end of 2023, RTVS will not participate in Eurovision in other periods either. The participation of Slovak artists is associated with high financial costs, for which RTVS does not have the resources.”
Slovakia first attempted to participate in Eurovision in 1993, but they didn’t manage to qualify from the qualifying round Kvalifikacija za Millstreet (Qualification for Millstreet). The band Elán finished in fourth place, and missed out on a spot in the Eurovision 1993 final by one point. Despite not qualifying, the Slovak broadcaster did send a commentary team to Ireland, and broadcast the contest live.
Slovakia made its first official Eurovision participation in 1994, with the band “Tublatanka” and their song “Nekonečná pieseň” (Neverending story). They finished in 19th place with 15 points, and thus did not receive a high enough placing to qualify for the 1995 contest, which they sat out and did not broadcast.
Slovakia returned to Eurovision in 1996 with Marcel Palonder, who managed to qualify from the audio-only qualification round. At the Eurovision final, they finished in 18th place with 19 points. However, this was still not enough to automatically qualify for the 1997 contest, so the country returned in 1998 with Katarína Hasprová, who finished in 21st place with 8 points.
After being relegated from the 1999 contest, the country declined to return in 2000, citing financial concerns. After their neighbours Czechia made their Eurovision debut in 2007, STV stated they would like to return in 2008, but in the end didn’t, because they didn’t have enough funds. They returned in 2009, and had a further three participations in 2010, 2011 and 2012; but sadly did not manage to qualify to the final on any of these occassions, and withdrew from 2013 onwards.
Are you surprised to see Slovakia out of Eurovision 2025? Do you think the country will ever return to the Eurovision Song Contest? Let us know your thoughts on this in the comments below!
