Today (21st September), Polish broadcaster TVP announced that Roksana Wegiel has been internally selected to represent Poland at this year’s Junior Eurovision in Minsk on 25th November. Roksana’s song is set to be released at a later date.
Internal selection for the first time
2018 marks the first ever time that Poland has selected their entrant for the Junior Eurovision Song Contest internally. On Poland’s past participations in 2003, 2004, 2016 and 2017, they used a national final to select their entrant, however, it has been reported that due to poor results in both 2016 and 2017 (11th and 8th place respectively), they have decided to internally select Roksana this year.
Poland are not the only country to select their entrant internally for this year’s contest – Australia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, FYR Macedonia and Serbia have all also selected their entrants for the contest internally.
Poland’s announcement of whether they will host a national final again or opt for internal selection has been long awaited, after they confirmed for the contest back at the start of January this year.
Who is Roksana Wegiel?
13-year old, Roksana Wegiel, was born in Poland on 11th January 2005. Roskana rose to fame after winning the first season of the Polish version of The Voice Kids, back in February this year.
Roksana’s coach on The Voice Kids was Poland’s debut Eurovision representative, Edyta Górniak, who represented the country in 1994 with the song, “To nie ja”, finishing in 2nd place behind winners Ireland. Roskana performed a range of songs during the course of the show including Beyoncé’s “Halo”, Miley Cyrus’ “Wrecking Ball”, Prince’s “Purple Rain”, Edyta Gorniak’s “To nie ja” and her original winning song, “Żyj”. You can hear her performance of “To nie ja” below:
The young singer, who has over 217 thousand followers on Instagram, said in a statement that:
Winning The Voice Kids was an honour and a dream come true, but representing my country at Junior Eurovision is an actual honour. Dreaming and fighting for your dreams is worthy. Thanks for believing in me!”
Poland in the Junior Eurovision Song Contest
Poland made their debut in the Junior Eurovision Song Contest when the contest began in 2003, in Copenhagen, Denmark. After winning the Polish national final for the contest Katarzyna Żurawik represented the nation with the song, “Coś mnie nosi”. Unfortunately, they finished last with just three points. In 2004, Poland came out with exactly the same result, finishing in the last place slot with again, three points.
After two years of poor results and despite TVP signing a 3-year contract with the EBU, Poland decided to withdraw from the contest in 2005. The country did not return to compete again until 2016, despite rumours in 2008 that the broadcaster was considering making a return.
On their return in 2016, Poland sent Olivia Wieczorek with the song “Nie zapomnij”, which as already mentioned, finished in 11th place with 60 points. Last year, Alicja Rega represented Poland with the song “Moj dom”, scoring Poland’s best result to date, finishing in 8th place with 138 points.
You can hear Alicja’s performance in Tbilisi last year below:
Are you excited to see Roksana represent Poland? What type of song do you hope she performs? Do you think she will better Poland’s best result of eighth place?
Let us know in the comments below and on social media @ESCXTRA.
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