Rishi Ra­goonath

It was an evening of glitz, glam­our and pure is­land pride on May 18 at the Cen­tre of Ex­cel­lence, Ma­coya, for the grand coro­na­tion of Mrs and Miss Uni­verse T&T 2025.

Steal­ing the spot­light and cap­ti­vat­ing hearts were An­cil­la Kir­by-Scott, rep­re­sent­ing Laven­tille, and Priya Ali from Clax­ton Bay—the women who will now car­ry the na­tion­al flag to the glob­al fi­nals in the Philip­pines and South Ko­rea lat­er this year.

Kir­by-Scott, 34, who was crowned Mrs Uni­verse T&T, said, “I am ho­n­oured to be crowned Mrs Uni­verse 2025. Rep­re­sent­ing Laven­tille, my cher­ished home, fills me with pride as I car­ry the hopes and dreams of my com­mu­ni­ty.”

She added, “Win­ning the crown is not mere­ly a per­son­al tri­umph for me; it sym­bol­is­es pur­pose, re­silience, and rep­re­sen­ta­tion. As some­one deeply root­ed in the Laven­tille com­mu­ni­ty, this crown pro­vides me with a plat­form to chal­lenge stereo­types and am­pli­fy voic­es that are of­ten over­looked.”

Miss Uni­verse T&T Priya Ali, 18, im­pressed judges and the au­di­ence with her grace and elo­quence. A stu­dent at Chin­maya Vidyalaya Sant Tul­si­das Cam­pus, she said: “Win­ning this pageant is an in­cred­i­ble ho­n­our and a deeply hum­bling ex­pe­ri­ence. It rep­re­sents the cul­mi­na­tion of ded­i­ca­tion, per­se­ver­ance, and per­son­al growth.”

Ali’s jour­ney was not with­out chal­lenges.

“Bal­anc­ing in­tense pageant prepa­ra­tion with my CAPE stud­ies was one of the biggest chal­lenges I faced,” she ad­mit­ted. “That ex­pe­ri­ence taught me dis­ci­pline, re­silience, and the val­ue of hard work

“I plan to show­case Trinidad and To­ba­go’s beau­ty, cul­ture, and spir­it on every in­ter­na­tion­al stage I step on­to.”

Al­so win­ning ti­tles were Aliana Seep­er­sad, Miss Mul­ti­cul­tur­al World T&T; Ru­by Mo­hammed, Miss Mul­ti­cul­tur­al World T&T; Reneise Jo­gee-Ali, Miss Woman of the Uni­verse T&T; Meguel­la Si­mon, Mrs Woman of the Uni­verse T&T; and Can­dace Pic­ton Fri­day, Mrs Grand In­ter­na­tion­al T&T