Malta participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2009 with the song "What If We" written by Marc Paelinck and Gregory Bilsen. The song was performed by Chiara, who had previously represented Malta at the Eurovision Song Contest in the 1998 and 2005 edition where she achieved third and second place with the songs "The One That I Love" and "Angel", respectively. The Maltese entry for the 2009 contest in Moscow, Russia was selected through the national final GO Malta EuroSong 2009, organised by the Maltese broadcaster Public Broadcasting Services (PBS). The competition consisted of a semi-final round and a final, held between 8 November 2008 and 7 February 2009, where "What If We" performed by Chiara eventually emerged as the winning entry after scoring the most points from a jury in the first round and gaining the most votes from a public televote in the second round with 12,249 votes.
Malta was drawn to compete in the first semi-final of the Eurovision Song Contest which took place on 12 May 2009. Performing during the show in position 17, "What If We" was announced among the 10 qualifying entries of the first semi-final and therefore qualified to compete in the final on 16 May. It was later revealed that Malta placed sixth out of the 18 participating countries in the semi-final with 86 points. In the final, Malta performed in position 14 and placed twenty-second out of the 25 participating countries, scoring 31 points.
Background
Prior to the 2009 contest, Malta had participated in the Eurovision Song Contest twenty-one times since its first entry in 1971. Malta briefly competed in the Eurovision Song Contest in the 1970s before withdrawing for sixteen years. The country had, to this point, competed in every contest since returning in 1991. Malta's best placing in the contest thus far was second, which it achieved on two occasions: in 2002 with the song "7th Wonder" performed by Ira Losco and in the 2005 contest with the song "Angel" performed by Chiara. In the 2008 edition, Malta failed to qualify to the final with the song "Vodka" performed by Morena.
For the 2009 contest, the Maltese national broadcaster, Public Broadcasting Services (PBS), broadcast the event within Malta and organised the selection process for the nation's entry. PBS confirmed their intentions to participate at it on 3 June 2008. Malta selected their entry consistently through a national final procedure, a method that was continued for their 2009 participation.
Before Eurovision
GO Malta EuroSong 2009
GO Malta EuroSong 2009 was the national final format developed by PBS to select the Maltese entry for the Eurovision Song Contest 2009. The competition consisted of a semi-final held between 8 November 2008 and 10 January 2009, and a final held on 7 February 2009. All shows were broadcast on Television Malta (TVM) as well on the broadcaster's website pbs.com.mt.
Format
The competition consisted of fifty-six songs competing in the semi-final which consisted of eight shows titled Euro Showbox between 8 November 2008 and 10 January 2009. Seven songs were presented in each show and a total of twenty entries qualified to compete in the final on 7 February 2009. In the semi-final, six judges evaluated the songs and each judge had an equal stake in the result. Fifteen of the qualifying entries were the songs that received the highest scores from the judges, while the remaining five qualifying entries were based on the results of the public televote from the remaining forty-one entries. The final consisted of two rounds: the first round selected the top three entries based on the votes of five judges in addition to the jury votes in the first selection phase and the semi-final, while the second round (superfinal) determined the winner exclusively by public televoting.