By Nathan Stella Last updated Apr 23, 2020
Today the City Council had come together in Rotterdam to discuss whether they want to host the Eurovision Song Contest 2021 in their city. Money was an important issue as the city had spent 8.1 million euros on the expected 2020 event of which a maximum of 6.7 million will not be covered by the insurance.
News came out today that the City Council would love to have the contest in the city in 2021! Ahoy Rotterdam would also with pleasure be host to the musical spectacle again! Several politicians from within the City Council do admit, however, that lots of possible scenarios will have to be considered, as with the COVID-19 pandemic, the future is very unpredictable, but the intention to host is there!
The EBU (whose first choice to host the next contest was Rotterdam indeed) had urged the City Council of Rotterdam to come to an agreement so they would know the hosting of Eurovision next year will be possible. Now that step 1 has been taken, the NPO, NOS and AVROTROS will go and deliberate on a bunch of organisatorial questions and they hope to share good news with us concerning that in May!
A spokesperson for NOS has stated:
"We understand that The Netherlands, Rotterdam, Ahoy, the participating countries and ofcourse the fans would like to know as soon as possible if that means that the 65th Eurovision Song Contest will be taking place in Rotterdam indeed.
To carefully lay the foundation for a successful hosting of the contest in 2021, we do need a little more time.
We hope to be able to share news in May!"
Furthermore, political party Leefbaar Rotterdam had proposed to make free tickets available to healthcare workers, as a token of gratitude.
That motion was granted!