The original plan for NTU was to assemble a seven-person jury to select 30 songs between 21 and 23 January 2009 to perform in an untelevised semi-final, to be held on 1 February 2009behind closed doors. From these 30 songs, 15 of them were to qualify for a televised final to be held on 22 February 2009. On 20 January 2009, a total of 63 entries were submitted to NTU. However, changes to the format for the contest were announced at the same time. Two semi-finals were to be held on 7 and 8 February 2009, featuring 20 songs in total, possibly held at the Sports Palace in Kiev, where the 2005 Eurovision was held. This was yet again changed on 21 January 2009, where it was revealed that now only one semi-final will be held on 8 February 2009, held at the NTU studio instead of the Sports Palace.
Semi-final
The semi-final was held internally by NTU on 8 February 2009 in order to select 15 entries to compete in the final. After the semi-final, it was reported that the performer Anastasiya Prykhodko and her manager claimed that neither the National Television Company of Ukraine nor the National Jury had used trustworthy methods to choose the contestants for the final. Prykhodko's interpretation of the rules was that in the semi-final, she had been entitled to perform something different from their Eurovision entry song. In fact, Paragraph 4.3 of the Rules of Eurovision Song Competition issued by the NCTU on 31 October 2008 stated literally: "On 8 February 2009 on the improvised stage set in the NTVU studios, the 30 semi-finalists perform their competition songs live." On the grounds of the paragraph, the Jury disqualified Pryhodko for performing a song from her repertoire of the times of the Star FactoryTV show called "Vsyo dlya tebya". Prykhodko would later enter the Russian national final on 7 March 2009, winning with "Mamo" and represented Russia at the 2009 contest. Despite being one of the finalists, NikitA subsequently withdrew before the final.
Final
The final, to be held on 8 March 2009, was temporarily suspended by a national arbitration committee due to the protest filed by Prykhodko. However, the national final went ahead on 8 March 2009 at the Ukraina Palace in Kiev, where the winner was decided via the 50/50 combination of votes from a public televote and an expert jury. Svetlana Loboda won the national final with the song "Be My Valentine", receiving maximum points from both the jury and televote. The song will be performed at Eurovision as "Be My Valentine! ".
Promotion
After winning the national final, Svitlana released the promotional video for "Be My Valentine! ", which will be shown around Europe before the contest. Svitlana performed with a number of other entries in the 2009 contest at two international events: on 17 April the Ukrainian entry performed at the UKEurovision Preview Party at the Scala in London; she also performed on 18 April at the Eurovision Promo Concert in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, along with entries from 22 other countries.
At Eurovision
Ukraine competes in the second semi-final of the contest on 14 May 2009. Svetlana performs 17th in the running order of the semi-final, following Albania and preceding Estonia. Svitlana released news on her performance at Eurovision that she would perform on stage with a large mechanical device known as the "Hell Machine", appearing somewhat like a cog. The device would descend and rotate from the top of the stage, and to be accompanied by embedded lights. The song qualified for the final where it finished 12th with 76 points.
