Eurovision 2027 Lost the Netherlands Because No Broadcaster Would Run Its Entry
The Dutch entry did not lose a vote. It lost every carrier it was offered to, and NPO would not force one to take it.
NPO went looking for someone inside Dutch public broadcasting to run the country’s Eurovision 2027 entry and came back without a name. The umbrella organisation announced on Tuesday that the Netherlands will not take part in the contest in Burgas, Bulgaria, reversing the return it had announced in September. Jet de Ranitz, chair of the NPO executive board, said it was “currently too early” to participate, and the contest will still be shown on the public channels, with NOS providing commentary. Reaction under NOS’s own breaking-news post split between praise for the decision and criticism of months of indecision.
AVROTROS, the broadcaster that had run the Dutch entry since 2014, pulled out in August, when it said the contest could “no longer be considered neutral” while a participating country remained involved in a large-scale military conflict, and handed responsibility for the Dutch entry back to NPO. Its objection was aimed at Israel’s participation and at the war in Gaza, and it said the EBU’s recent changes had not restored its confidence that the contest’s independent and neutral character was intact.
Under the EBU’s August rule change, a winning broadcaster caught in an armed conflict or a sensitive geopolitical situation cannot host the following year’s contest: the EBU may commission an independent security assessment and appoint an alternative host instead. AVROTROS had spent the previous year pressing for transparent rules on countries involved in a military conflict competing, and a rule about who stages the show left that complaint untouched. The voting overhaul the EBU announced for 2026, juries back in the semi-finals at a 50/50 split with the public vote, seven jurors instead of five with at least two aged 18 to 25, a viewer vote cap cut from 20 to 10, and limits on promotion including government-backed campaigns, was the material NPO pointed to in September when it said the EBU had taken significant steps.
NPO announced in September that the Netherlands would return, with an independent team of experts selecting and supporting the Dutch act, staffed by freelancers without close ties to the country’s broadcasters, while NOS handled the broadcast, previews and commentary. The workaround then ran into the same wall as the original job, because none of the broadcasters would provide staff for the expert team either, and NPO said it had been unable to find a suitable format for a return.
Omroep MAX had already walked back an earlier proposal to step in for AVROTROS. KRO-NCRV and BNNVARA then confirmed they would not take on the organising duty either. Seven broadcasters, AVROTROS, BNNVARA, EO, HUMAN, Omroep ZWART, PowNed and VPRO, wrote jointly to ask how the return had been decided, how it would be organised, how it would be funded, and whether the Netherlands could still withdraw without paying financial penalties.
Around 400 public-broadcasting employees signed an open letter under the hashtag #NietMijnSongfestival, addressed to NPO’s management and board, arguing in short that an entertainment programme should not be weighed above lives lost, and that those who take connection seriously must “listen to those who are affected by a decision.” The letter was reported by de Volkskrant. A Dutch MP, Mohammed Mohandis, put written questions to Culture Minister Rianne Letschert about whether NPO’s coordinating role was consistent with Dutch media law, specifically Article 2.88. De Ranitz also closed off the last administrative route, saying it would be “irresponsible to oblige a broadcaster” to run the entry, which is why the task broadcaster NTR was never designated to do it.
The system has 13 broadcasters: nine member-based, AVROTROS, BNNVARA, EO, HUMAN, KRO-NCRV, MAX, PowNed, VPRO and WNL, alongside two task broadcasters, NOS and NTR, and two provisional ones, Ongehoord Nederland and Omroep Zwart. NPO coordinates them; it does not own an entry of its own. A Dutch Eurovision act needs a broadcaster willing to carry it, and by Tuesday there was not one.
Elsewhere, the five countries that sat out the 2026 contest in Vienna are no longer moving together. Ireland’s RTÉ will neither send an entry nor broadcast the 2027 contest. Spain’s public broadcaster has a president recommending another year out, with its board decision still pending. Iceland’s RÚV board has backed a boycott on conditions. Slovenia’s return is reported as likely after a change of government, though its broadcaster decides independently. Fan-tracked participant lists put Canada in as a debutant and North Macedonia as a returnee, with the EBU’s official list expected in December. Czechia is out over spending cuts rather than protest.
Martin Green, the contest’s director, answered the Dutch decision for the EBU by saying the organisation was “deeply sorry” NPO would not take part, that it respected the strength of feeling behind the decision, and that it was “very happy” the contest would still be broadcast in the Netherlands. He said the EBU looked forward to welcoming a Dutch entry again when NPO, its members and audiences felt the time was right. He said the EBU would keep talking with NPO and with Dutch fans.
In Malmö in 2024, the Dutch entry Joost Klein was disqualified from the final after an incident in which he made a threatening movement towards a camerawoman who filmed him after he had asked not to be filmed. AVROTROS called the penalty “very heavy and disproportionate.” The Netherlands has been in the contest since the first edition in 1956 and has won five times, most recently with Duncan Laurence’s “Arcade” in 2019, the first Eurovision entry to reach one billion streams on Spotify.
The 2026 final in Vienna drew 131 million viewers, 35 million fewer than the year before, after five countries stayed away. Dara’s “Bangaranga” won it for Bulgaria with 516 points.
