RYAN BA­CHOO

ryan.ba­choo@cnc3.co.tt

Trinidad and To­ba­go is down to its fi­nal 17 ladies who are vy­ing to rep­re­sent this coun­try at the 2023 Miss World com­pe­ti­tion.

The fi­nal­ists were re­vealed on Sun­day evening at the Brix Au­to­graph Col­lec­tion ho­tel ahead of the grand fi­nal, which is set to take place at the Na­tion­al Acad­e­my for the Per­form­ing Arts (NA­PA) on No­vem­ber 6.

Among the young ladies mak­ing the fi­nal was 18-year-old Miss Princes Town, An­jali Ramkissoon. She is the youngest of all the com­peti­tors. Speak­ing af­ter­wards, Charu Lochan Dass, fran­chise hold­er and na­tion­al pageant di­rec­tor of Miss World T&T, praised the young women who made it to the fi­nal.

A week be­fore, over 50 ladies from across the coun­try were screened as they bid to make the fi­nal and while the in­ten­tion was to se­lect 15 fi­nal­ists, the judges had a tough chal­lenge on their hands and al­lowed a fur­ther two for the fi­nal.

Lochan Dass said, “For the past week, I have had the priv­i­lege and op­por­tu­ni­ty to meet and work with these ex­tra­or­di­nary young women. We re­al­ly have a great bunch on board and it’s so amaz­ing to see these young women so ded­i­cat­ed and so pas­sion­ate about the pageant.”

She said the prizes on of­fer this year are the best they have been in the his­to­ry of the lo­cal pageant.

West Bees Su­per­mar­ket has spon­sored $100,000 in cash prizes while the School of Ac­count­ing and Man­age­ment will give a schol­ar­ship to the win­ner. Guardian Me­dia is the of­fi­cial me­dia part­ner of the event.

Lochan Dass added, “Prizes like these have nev­er been giv­en for our win­ners be­fore and our aim is to el­e­vate the pageant and bring back pres­tige in­to pageantry. In or­der to do so, we had to have the right spon­sors and part­ners on board.”

Richard Young, who is a mem­ber of the screen­ing pan­el and a Caribbean styl­ist and pro­duc­tion de­sign­er, will help pre­pare the young women for one of the biggest mo­ments of their lives so far.

At the event, he said, “I am look­ing for­ward to craft­ing one of the most en­thralling shows of the beau­ty of T&T. We rep­re­sent one of the most plur­al spaces in the world and I plan to use that plu­ral­i­ty to in­form what we do on No­vem­ber 6.

“We are go­ing to have women of dif­fer­ent heights, sizes and eth­nic­i­ties from Scar­bor­ough to Mara­cas to San Fer­nan­do to Co­corite to Cou­va to Ch­agua­nas to Port of Spain to Diego Mar­tin. It was re­al­ly a na­tion­wide search.”

Car­la Cu­pid, CEO of the Trinidad Tourism Ltd, added that the event can take T&T to the world.

She said, “We have to look abroad or even here for per­sons who would mar­ket the des­ti­na­tion and who would act as am­bas­sadors of T&T. They would al­so have to share our cul­ture, our beau­ty and our tal­ent and when we come up­on an event like Miss World, we see it as a win-win. We see it as ben­e­fi­cial be­cause we are tap­ping in­to these ladies who will share what they have ex­pe­ri­enced in T&T and share the des­ti­na­tion.”

The 17 fi­nal­ists:

Jemi­ma Pierre (Miss Ari­ma)

Tine­sha William (Miss Arou­ca)

Lys­tia Mulzac (Miss Care­nage)

Gab­bi Pope (Miss Ch­agua­nas)

Janelle Pir­mal (Miss Clax­ton Bay)

Da­nia Duntin (Miss Cunu­pia)

Em­ma-Leigh Aqui (Miss Di­a­mond Vale)

Or­nel­la Men­doza (Miss Diego Mar­tin)

Gabriel­la Jag­mo­han (Miss Glen­coe)

Nat­to­la Williams (Miss La Hor­quet­ta)

Fe­li­cia Ra­moutar (Miss Mara­bel­la)

Aché Abra­hams (Miss Mara­cas Val­ley)

Brenique Richards (Miss Mor­vant)

Tian­na Cor­rie (Miss Pa­lo Seco)

An­jali Ramkissoon (Miss Princes Town)

Sa­van­nah Sandy (Miss San Juan)