Less than a month after Basel was announced as the host of the 2025 Eurovision Song Contest, the event already faces its first hurdle. The Federal Democratic Union (EDU) has launched a referendum against holding the competition in the city, citing financial and religious reasons.
In a statement, the EDU confirmed that it had launched a referendum against the Eurovision Song Contest (ESC) in Basel, which will be held at St. Jakobshalle between May 13 and 17, 2025. Switzerland won the right to host the competition thanks to Nemo, who surged to victory at this year's event in Sweden with their hit song The Code.
The referendum itself is in response to the cantonal parliament of Basel, which decided to fund ESC 2025 with a loan of 34,9 million francs. If accepted, the EDU’s proposal would prohibit the cantonal government from using the money to fund the event.
While officials from the national broadcaster SRG SSR previously said that the competition would still likely go ahead without the loan, the EDU said it hoped the vote would force the competition to relocate outside of the city and even out of the country entirely.
On the referendum website, the EDU - which has no parliamentary representation in Basel - argued that hosting the competition would be a waste of public money, at a time when the country is planning austerity measures. EDU representative Samuel Kullmann, the main figure behind the referendums which scuppered Zurich and Bern’s chance of hosting the competition, told the Tages-Anzeiger that the party also opposed Eurovision on religious grounds.
Though he does not watch Eurovision regularly, he and his party colleagues were appalled by the most recent competition in Malmö. “For us as Christians, Satanism is the epitome of evil. We simply cannot accept that something like this is supported with taxpayers' money," Kullmann noted.
The main reason for the EDU’s sudden interest in stopping the competition can be attributed to Irish singer Bambie Thug’s performance at Eurovision in 2024. In their performance, the artist - who practices witchcraft - wore horns and a black feathered robe during her performance, while flirting with a figure meant to represent the Devil. Kullmann questioned why, if the ESC bans religious symbolism, "occultism and Satanism are allowed to be openly celebrated?"
In the competition's semi-final, Thug also wore markings written in the Irish alphabet Ogham that translated to “ceasefire” and “freedom for Palestine”. Though these symbols were changed for the final, the EDU argued that this, combined with the “hostility” shown towards the Israeli entry, made the event anti-Semitic.
While the EDU baulks at the messaging provided by the Eurovision Song Contest in 2024, the competition actually has a rich history of political and social activism. For instance, Ukraine has long used its songs to oppose the Russian invasion of its country - from its song in 2016 (Jamala, 1944) detailing the Soviet deportation of Crimean Tartars during World War Two, to its victory in 2022 with the Kalush Orchestra's song Stefania.
“We freed ourselves from the Soviet Empire through song,” said Estonian Prime Minister Mart Laar after the country became the first ex-Soviet State to win the competition in 2001.
Eurovision has also been instrumental in bringing diverse voices to the fore, most famously when Austrian drag queen Conchita Wurst won the event in 2014. Switzerland at Eurovision has also been groundbreaking, with Nemo being the first winner of the competition to identify as non-binary. They have since used their win to advocate for Switzerland to recognise a third gender.
The EDU now has until October 26 to collect 2.000 signatures to make the proposal into a referendum. It would then be voted on in November 2024. With the party receiving less than 1 percent of the vote in Basel’s last cantonal election in 2020, and with the city boasting the highest proportion of non-religious people in the country, it is unclear how well their referendum will be received.
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