Last night while Azerbaijan and Romania continued their 100% percent qualification rate, spare a thought for the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.
This year was the fifth time in a row that it did not qualify to the Eurovision finals.
The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia made its official debut at the Eurovision proper in 1998 with Vlado Janevski and the song Ne zori, zoro. The song finished in 19th place and the country dropped out the following year. In fact in its first years in the contest, it only appeared in the even-numbered years.
When the semi finals began in 2004, the country qualified to the finals for the first four years. In 2006 it received its best placing with Elena Risteska and the song Ninanajna. During these years, the ex-Yugoslav countries were often accused of voting for each other, and this is often cited as one of the reasons the voting procedures changed.
The new voting rules did not work in the country’s favour, and from 2008-2011,the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia was left in the semi finals. The curse was broken in 2012 when Kaliopi passed to the finals with Crno I Belo.
However since then, the Former Yugoslav Republic has failed to make the finals, and so with a total of five years, it now holds the current record of the most years absent from the final. Ireland are running close with four times absent, and if they keep that up for another three years, their absence will equal their number of wins. The record for number of years failing to qualify for the final, falls with The Netherlands, who failed to make the final for eight years between 2005 and 2012.
Watch Jana Burčeska’s entry this year, Dance Alone, which at some point had been considered a well fancied song, until the live performance was revealed.
