Kamu Birliği

Kamu Birliği

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**Kamu Birliği** was a union of broadcasting organisations and a movement against the Country Contest jury system. It disbanded on January 22, 2018, following a chain reaction of withdrawals.

## Members

Table key
     Founding / administrating member
     Withdrawn member

### **Withdrawing members**

The first withdrawal, from  Iran, took place on 26 December 2017 following TRT's decision to annul the country's victory in the contest (claiming fraud voting).  Iraq followed the Iran and announced their withdrawal from the Union on 28 December 2017.

From then on, 9 members remained in the Union.  Moldova's TRM announced on 29 December 2017 that it "wanted to start 2018 with a fresh start" and announced that they would withdraw from the Union. Nevertheless, it was reported that the country's last place finish played a role in the withdrawal.

On 2 January 2018,  Syria TV announced that they would withdraw from the Union following an agreement with IRIB. On 4 January 2018,  Kosovo's RTK and  Albania's RTSH jointly announced their withdrawals from the Union, despite Kosovo's victory and Albania's 4th place, stating that "Provocation in the form of [Kamu Birliği] is just not something that we desire to do; it was a mistake for us to join in first place given the [ineffective method] and [drastic measures] taken by TRT."

TRT then alleged that "the [CCU]] unlawfully and unrightfully blackmailed the broadcasters to [leave] the Union, or elsewise facing [large sanctions] totaling 500,000 EUR." However, the CCU denied such statement, stating "We had attempted to [withdraw] our Members from the Union, but in a method which simply had not proven successful. It is with our gratitude that they decided the [rightful] choice, which had nothing to do with [us]. A number of Members had sent us a written apology which had suggested reasons for withdrawing including lack of quality in the [Kamu Birliği Festivali], communication and poor management. We ask the remaining Members to think, at this point, whether staying in the Union is a worthwhile choice."

On 8 January 2018, GBP announced that due to low reception of [the Union] in the country, that  Georgia would withdraw from the Union. On 11 January 2018,  Montenegro's RTV Atlas announced that due to government pressure, that they would withdraw from the Union but stated its hopes for a contest like [the Country Contest] to happen in the future [without the leadership of the CCU].

On 8 January 2018, following GBP's withdrawal, only the two administrating countries,  Azerbaijan and  Turkey remained in the Union. However, on 15 January 2018, protests erupted outside the headquarters of İTV and AzTV with headquarters with signs for [leaving the Union]. These protests enlarged in a matter of days, with protests additionally taking place outside the government facility. On 17 January 2018, AzTV announced that it would withdraw from the Union due to the "protest and damage towards its reputation". On 18 January 2018, İTV announced that they are an administrating member of the Union and they didn't feel like withdrawing was necessary, and encouraging protesters to "stop the nonsense." On 22 January 2018, İTV announced that  Azerbaijan would withdraw from the Union due to the local protests and backlash, marking the end of the Union.

### **Other countries**

* Russia: After the results of Country Contest 11, which saw Russia place its worst result (17th), C1R stated that a withdrawal from the contest would be possible. Furthermore, the broadcaster stated that it may join [Kamu Birliği], but was "reviewing the nature of it." C1R did not publicly state anything further regarding the Union, as the broadcaster continued competing in the Country Contest.

## Kamu Birliği Festivali

On November 26, 2017, it was announced that a country competition would take place among the members of the union. The competition will consist of 100% public vote. It was also confirmed that the contest would take place regardless the amount of participants.

### Confirmed participants

To date, ten countries have confirmed their participation.

* Albania
* Azerbaijan (İTV)
	+ ~~Baku (AzTV)~~
* Georgia
* Iran
* Iraq
* Kosovo
* Moldova
* Montenegro
* Turkey (host)
* Syria

## Kamu Birliği Festivali

 Final date
 Venue
 Number of entries
 Voting system
 Winning country

Following the first edition, TRT stated that "IRIB was involved in a fraud voting scheme," which IRIB denied. Following "an investigation", TRT announced that Iran would be disqualified from the next contest with Kosovo as the hosts. However, this caused IRIB to withdraw from the Union. A second edition of the contest was thereby put on hold after Iraq's withdrawal from the Union as well.

However, TRT later announced the possibility of continuing the contest but with a different format; instead of 57 points for each country, each country will have 100 points spread out depending on the number of votes for each country. Based on this, if a country were to get 30% of total votes, it would be awarded 30 points by the respective country. However, widespread withdrawal from Members led to the indefinite cancellation of the contest.

## Controversy

### CCU reaction, December 2017

Regarding the Kamu Birliği, the CCU stated that they "did take the measure of allowing one televote qualifier per semi-final to qualify" and that the 50% system was introduced in the Country Contest 5 for the betterment of the contest and "less politicization."

The CCU then said that any Member Broadcasters of the CCU who joined the [Public Union], would be annulled from the Union should they not leave the [Public Union] within 30 [business] days. TRT then stated that "it only proved [the CCU]'s hypocrisy" and officially withdrew from the Union. Despite CCU's statement, none of the member broadcasters in *Kamu Birliği* decided to leave; their statement only encouraged their stay.

## See also

* Swiss-Czech Protest Members, a former union of 18 countries protesting against the Country Contest

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