Gen­e­sis Clif­ford is the new queen of the Lystra Lewis Port-of-Spain Net­ball League.

The Queen Show and Cul­tur­al Pageant, themed “African Con­nec­tions”, was held at City Hall on Knox Street, Port-of-Spain, on Sat­ur­day (Ju­ly 6) evening.

The com­pe­ti­tion which re­turned af­ter a four-year ab­sence, saw Clif­ford of Car­di­nals Net­ball Club, rep­re­sent­ing Ethiopia, get­ting the nod from the judges among the 13 par­tic­i­pants.

“I feel so ex­cit­ed,” said Clif­ford af­ter win­ning the ti­tle, crowd­ed by her joy­ful sup­port­ers on stage all anx­ious to get a pho­to with the new queen. “Com­ing in­to the com­pe­ti­tion, I didn’t know what to ex­pect. We had a lot of oth­er beau­ti­ful girls and a lot of com­pe­ti­tion, and I’m so grate­ful to be this year’s queen.”

Clif­ford, a goal-shoot­er, was crowned by na­tion­al Un­der-21 cap­tain Des­tiny Williams of Soul City, who did her hand­ing over du­ty be­fore head­ing out yes­ter­day to Guade­loupe to lead T&T at the Amer­i­c­as Net­ball World Youth Qual­i­fiers. Williams won the ti­tle back in 2019 be­fore the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic hit.

The run­ner-up was Miss Zim­bab­we Chris­tine Wint of Mu­cu­rapo Ex-Pupils. In third place was Miss De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Re­pub­lic of Con­go Hermione Mar­tin of Spar­toms and in fourth, Miss Egypt Brit­tany Foder­ing­ham (SWW­TU Malvern).

The show opened with the con­tes­tants in­tro­duc­ing them­selves wear­ing their net­ball sports­wear all rep­re­sent­ing their re­spec­tive teams. Then it was time for the tal­ent show, which was di­verse with some do­ing dances, po­ems, and skit-style per­for­mances, play­ing a mu­si­cal in­stru­ment like Miss Zim­bab­we, who did drum­ming, and oth­ers, songs in­clud­ing the even­tu­al win­ner. Clif­ford’s tal­ent pre­sen­ta­tion with a com­bi­na­tion of a po­em, which tran­si­tioned in­to a song, then she played the na­tion­al in­stru­ment, the steel­pan which wowed the heav­i­ly en­gaged au­di­ence.

The evening wear seg­ment was just as vi­brant as the del­e­gates and dis­played their, clear­ly re­searched by most, African con­nec­tions.

Clif­ford’s green and gold pants out­fit and head­wear to match were ac­cen­tu­at­ed with a long drap­ing cape in­flu­enced by the na­tion­al flag of the Ethiopi­an coun­try—green, yel­low, and red with a cen­tral blue disk that dis­played a gold star.

Af­ter each in­di­vid­u­al­ly pa­rad­ed, all the del­e­gates took the stage and were ser­e­nad­ed by the 2023 Ca­lyp­so Monarch, Ta’zyah O’Con­nor, who pre­sent­ed to­kens to the con­tes­tants cour­tesy of the LL­POSNL. Ear­li­er dur­ing the break for the changeover, O’Con­nor did sev­er­al songs for the au­di­ence, acapel­la-style as the DJ was hav­ing is­sues. How­ev­er, it did not take away from O’Con­nor’s en­ter­tain­ing per­for­mance.

Clif­ford, Wint, Mar­tin, and Foder­ing­ham moved on to the fi­nal ques­tion round af­ter com­pet­ing against Miss Cameroon Nick­e­lia Gomez (Hori­zon), Miss Ethiopia Aki­ma Dick­son (Hill Girls), and Miss South Africa Saman­tha Greene (Laven­tille Unit­ed) in the top sev­en in the first ques­tions seg­ment.

Clif­ford emerged as the win­ner. In­di­vid­ual awards were al­so pre­sent­ed. Third-placed Mar­tin was award­ed the “Best Tal­ent”, while run­ner-up Wint won two cat­e­gories—“Best Sports­wear” and “Best Evening Wear”.

The oth­er del­e­gates in the com­pe­ti­tion were Miss Tan­za­nia Jechelle Daniel (Mal­ta Carib Sen­a­tors), Miss Ugan­da Serene Phillips (Laven­tille Unit­ed), Miss Mo­roc­co Makay­la Con­stan­tine (Mal­ta Carib Sen­a­tors), Miss An­go­la Ka­marie Charles (Ebony Z Champ), Miss Nige­ria Sari­ah Coltes (Tran­scend Unit­ed), and an­oth­er Miss Nige­ria Chevyl Doyle (Tran­scend Unit­ed).

All del­e­gates were gift­ed on the night. Mem­bers of the au­di­ence were al­so treat­ed with free Sun­day ice cream and sev­er­al won door prizes from Guilt­less Gourmet.

Spon­sors in­clud­ed Live Wire Me­dia Works, City Hall, Xtra Foods, Bermudez, Bic Tech­nol­o­gy, Carib Brew­ery, The Beau­ty and Spa, El­ka’s Beau­ty School and Sa­lon, Efie De­signs, Make­up Mag­ix, Guilt­less Gourmet, Ja­son Shields, Cas­ca­dia Ho­tel, Pet­tlin Trim, Avanelle As­soon, The Award Cen­tre, Jack­ie Chris­tians, Em­ploy­ees—Point Lisas Port, Odette John, In­terchem Lim­it­ed, Meghan Hold­er, Di­ane Pas­call, Amoy Van Lowe, and Ver-Jan Ser­vices, as well as sev­er­al friends and sup­port­ers.