Cyprus Cuts “Jalla” Clip Scenes After Backlash, as Antigoni Buxton Shrugs: “Let Them Talk”
Darlings, it’s February and Cyprus is already doing that very Eurovision thing where a three-minute music video turns into a full-blown national conversation, the kind that starts with “I don’t like that shot” and ends somewhere around “withdraw the entry”. Welcome back to the ecosystem.
The clip for “Jalla”, Antigoni Buxton’s song for Eurovision 2026, triggered criticism at home, and the broadcaster RIKhas now edited the video, removing scenes linked to traffic violations. Not a dramatic rebrand, not a total overhaul, just a very practical snip-snip in the parts that made people wince.
RIK edited the scenes, but they’re not touching the entry
The important bit is what didn’t happen: Cyprus didn’t panic-delete the whole participation. RIK’s move reads like the classic broadcaster compromise, the one you’ve seen a hundred times in different countries: “Fine, we’ll tweak the clip, but we’re still going to Eurovision.”
And yes, the backlash reportedly went beyond the usual grumbling. There were complaints from people in the arts and academic/education circles, and even calls for the song to be pulled. RIK, however, defended the participation and also pushed back against withdrawal demands that came from far-right corners. So the broadcaster is basically trying to keep this as “a video edit issue” rather than letting it become a culture-war circus.
Antigoni’s response is pure “I said what I said”
Antigoni Buxton, meanwhile, didn’t deliver a ten-paragraph apology or a carefully legalised statement that sounds like it was written by a committee in a windowless room. She went for something much simpler.
Her message, in essence: I love Cyprus, I showed Cyprus, I wanted to promote Cyprus abroad… and if people want to talk, let them talk.
It’s blunt, it’s emotionally legible, and it’s very local in tone. Not everyone will like it, but it’s a response you can picture someone actually saying without checking their notes.
Why this argument happens every single year
Because Eurovision is never just “a song”. It’s always also “what are you saying about us?” and “how will we look to outsiders?” and “is this the image we want to export?”
Some people looked at those motorbike/traffic moments and saw irresponsibility. Other people looked at the uproar and saw something else entirely: a country panicking over a clip that, to international viewers, might register as a vibe, not a manifesto. Both reactions can exist at the same time, and Eurovision thrives in that messy middle.
The awkward truth: the video is now part of the entry
Even if the revised version calms things down, Cyprus has already picked up a storyline. Sometimes that’s a gift, sometimes it’s a weight. It depends on whether the public mood softens, whether the updated clip feels “fixed” rather than “censored”, and whether the Eurovision bubble decides this is a one-week headline or something it keeps bringing up until May.
Either way, Cyprus is still going to Vienna 2026. The only thing that took a detour was a handful of scenes and everyone’s collective blood pressure.
Source: iefimerida.gr
