She did not place in last year’s Miss Barbados beauty pageant and there is no contest this year, but 21-year-old Marielle Wilkie will be representing the island in the Miss World Competition in Inner Mongolia, China in August.
Wilkie’s selection has been announced on the Miss Barbados World website which revealed that the organisers decided to forgo staging a local show in 2012 because, “this year’s Miss World Competition has permanently taken a shift from the traditional November date towards an earlier August finale”.
The website statement said the organization, as well as its partners and sponsors, had selected Wilkie, who participated in last year’s Miss Barbados Show.
The statement said Wilkie was “one who has already been through the 2011 Miss Barbados World experience, and has therefore been trained in etiquette, public speaking and has developed a successful charity project”.
“We have collectively assessed the 2011 delegates from first-runner up, based on their aptitude, drive and continuation of their charity projects subsequent to the 2011 finale; their current schedules have also been a major factor in our analysis.”
The selection of a contestant has taken well known pageant promoter, Clairmonte Grazette by surprise.
He told to the WEEKEND NATION yesterday: “When I saw it, ‘I said she did not win a Barbados pageant to qualify’. She took part in the pageant last year and did not place. You can’t do a pageant last year and pick someone from that pageant to send for this year’s. There is nothing in the rules I know that can allow that.”
Efforts to reach Leah Marville head of the host company of the Miss Barbados World franchise were unsuccesful. (JS)
