SHE had to parade in a bikini at a mall as men gawked and took photos.
This was one of the reasons why Ms Colleen Francisca-Mason, the winner of Miss Singapore World 2006, claims she wrote and complained to the British chairman and CEO of Miss World Limited, Ms Julia Morley, last year.
Ms Morley told The New Paper last week that people had written to her with complaints about the Miss Singapore World pageant.
As a result, she has had to recently appoint Mr Raymund Ooi of Limelite Productions as the new licensee for the pageant.
Ms Francisca-Mason said that she had written to Ms Morley and told her she was upset by how the pageant has been run here by ex-licensee ERM World Marketing (ERM).
ERM ran the pageant for the last seven years.
Said Ms Francisca-Mason, 29, a business owner: “I’ve had it with the fact that pageants are viewed in Singapore as a national joke, that’s why I finally wrote to her.
“It really doesn’t help when the licensee puts the contestants at promotional events where they are made to feel embarrassed.
“I remember I had to parade in a bikini at Eastpoint Mall and was gawked at by old men taking pictures with their handphones.”
Ms Francisca-Mason conceded that taking part in a beauty pageant entailed parading in public but she said that all she wanted was to have been treated with a little more respect.
For example, she said that the promotional events could have been held in a ballroom or somewhere more classy.
“The worst thing was that we had to do the same thing again and again at the same place.
“When we weren’t in bikinis, we were wearing clothes sponsored by This Fashion. There’s nothing wrong with This Fashion clothes but ERM could definitely have found us better sponsors.”
Apart from relating her pageant experience here, Ms Francisca-Mason also sent Ms Morley news clippings of the Miss Singapore World pageant and comments from Singaporeans about the pageant on the Internet forums.
She had also proposed to Ms Morley that she would be the best candidate to run the Miss World pageant here.
Ms Francisca-Mason owns a dessert company and a fashion boutique.
She said: “My purpose now is to get in touch with the new licensee as I hope to be the national director for this pageant.
“I think with my experience in the pageant, I will be a great help.”
Ms Francisca-Mason was the first runner-up in The New Paper New Face contest in 2001.
She also won Mrs Singapore World 2008 and emerged first runner-up at Mrs World 2008 where the international finals was held in Russia.
Ms Morley did not confirm via e-mail if Ms Francisca-Mason was one of the people who had e-mailed her.
She had told The New Paper last week that she didn’t want to give further details about this.
Ms Morley would only say that she was looking forward to meeting the family of a Singaporean boy that she had helped more than 30 years ago when she next visits Singapore.
When contacted, Ms Tracy Lee, an events consultant at ERM, said that the swimwear round is an important part of the contest to judge physical beauty, self confidence and poise as the pageant is primarily a beauty contest.
Said Ms Lee: “If she (Colleen) had felt embarrassed, then she could have withdrawn from the contest and not participated at all.
“The show was meant for the public to watch for free.
“There is no harm for people to take photos when they admire beautiful women.”
In reply to Ms Francisca-Mason’s wish for better clothes sponsors, Ms Lee said that up-market brands in Singapore do not sponsor or lend their clothes for pageants “for fear of them getting dirty or damaged by careless contestants or models”.
She added: “What is wrong with clothes from This Fashion? They specially created a line of clothes for the Miss Singapore World Pageant that year.
“What did she expect? Gucci or Prada? If you are beautiful and a good model, you will look good and confident in any clothes, be it a $50 dress or a $2,000 dress.”
Played ‘beergirl’
The New Paper also spoke to other Miss Singapore World contestants.
Ms Roshni Soin, 25, a model who won Miss Singapore World 2007 said there were gigs that she was made to attend during the pageant that she felt was unfit for a beauty queen.
Said Ms Soin: “I remember four of us (finalists) had to pour beer for two hours at this country club in ‘beergirl dresses’ complete with knee-high boots.
“We were paid $200 each for that event and during the event, I escaped to the toilet for some time because I didn’t understand how we could be subjected to this.”
Ms Soin added that eventually she was told by the pageant organisers that the event was a mistake and that the person who made that mistake had been fired by the company.
Said Ms Soin: “I also did a photoshoot with a sponsor who told me that I would receive a rather large payment for it.
“But when I asked about the payment, I was told that it was to go to covering my airfare for the finals in China.”
Ms Pilar Arlando, 22, a student who became the eventual Miss Singapore World 2009, said that she too didn’t like being paraded around in a bikini for pre-pageant promotional events.
Said Ms Arlando: “I agree with Colleen in that we were also made to parade in bikinis every Saturday and Sunday for a month before the pageant.
“I didn’t see the purpose of that. And we wore the same bikini at every event.
“It would have been much better if there was a smart-casual round and then an evening gown round.”
Ms Arlando added that her other gripe with the pageant was that the contestants were not given the chance to do more charity work.
She said: “We only did one such event. So on my own, I’ve been doing charity work with visually handicapped children.
“In August, I will be going to Cambodia to help build school huts for the children there.
The New Paper contacted ERM again for their response to Ms Soin’s and Ms Arlando’s comments but Ms Lee said they would no longer be commenting “on the subject of Miss Singapore World”.
She said: “We are no longer the licensee for it, though in the past seven years we have done our best with the conditions that we have faced in Singapore (with regards to) running the event.
“We wish the new licensee well and hope he is able to achieve what he intends to do with the pageant henceforth.”
This article was first published in The New Paper.
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My sentiments exactly. These people that sit on blog and criticize, what have they done?
I suspect it is the organizers ERM writing all this.
Colleen has the experience and will pull this off for sure.
No standards at all.