Dutch participant sacked as police investigate ‘incident’

The Dutch Eurovision contestant was eliminated due to an “incident” following his performance at Thursday’s semi-final in Malmo, Sweden.

The European Broadcasting Union confirmed the news of Joost Klein’s removal today (Saturday May 11, 2024) ahead of tonight’s grand finale.

Klein is now facing a police investigation over a complaint from a female production employee, the EBU said. Klein was supposed to represent his country with the song “Europapa”.

“It would not be appropriate for him to continue” – European Broadcasting Union

“Swedish police have investigated a complaint made by a female member of the production team following an incident following his performance in the semi-finals on Thursday evening. While the legal process takes its course, it would not be appropriate for him to take part in the competition,” an EBU representative said this afternoon.

“We would like to clarify that contrary to some media reports and social media speculation, no other artist or delegation member was involved in this incident,” the statement continued.

In a post on the official Eurovision Song Contest account

New rules ahead of the Eurovision Grand Final 2024

“All participants keep their number in the official running order. There will be NO song at position 5.

“The jury results received after dress rehearsal 2 on Friday May 10th have been recalculated so that the Netherlands will not receive any points. For this reason, all jury members must rate all songs from 1 to 26. For example, if the Netherlands was ranked 9th by a national jury in a country, the song ranked 10th is now ranked 9th and gets 2 points, just as the song ranked 11th is now 10th and gets 1 point.

“No points will be awarded to the Netherlands by the viewing public. Viewers in the Netherlands are still allowed to vote in the Grand Final and the result of the Dutch jury still stands. The EBU will inform all telecommunications partners that the Netherlands is no longer participating and we will endeavor to close the lines for Song 5. We ask that no one tries to vote for Song 5. Should anyone attempt to vote for song 5, their vote will not count, but there is a possibility that viewers will be charged. The Netherlands will not appear on the scoreboard.”

The final of the 68th Eurovision Song Contest is now taking place with 25 participating songs.

Former Years & Years singer Olly Alexander will represent the UK with his song ‘Dizzy’.