KUCHING: Twenty-four Miss Grand finalists will compete in the coming Miss Grand Malaysia 2020 final at the end of June.
“We have not yet decided on the actual date but it is going to be sometime at the end of June this year,” said Miss Grand Malaysia national director Jude Benjamin Lisa.
“We are looking at two locations — Kuching or Kuala Lumpur — to host the event. We are looking have 24 ladies from throughout Malaysia to take part.
“Six states (Sabah, Sarawak, Kuala Lumpur, Selangor, Johor and Melaka) will have two top winners each to reach the national level for a total of 12 finalists,” he said.
The other 12 finalists will be chosen from wild cards from the state-level competitions at the discretion of the organisers.
Prior to the national-level final, the participating states will hold their own pre-events.
“For the Sarawak-level, there will be 18 contestants,” he told the New Sarawak Tribune in a brief interview after attending Miss Grand Lundu 2020 coronation night at Penview Convention Centre (PCC) in Demak on Saturday.
The Miss Grand competitions first started in 2017 with only three participating states, namely, Sabah, Sarawak and Kuala Lumpur.
This year, there are six states participating with the addition of Selangor, Johor and Melaka. To qualify for the state-level competitions, the contestants go through district-level and divisional-level contests. There are 15 districts in Sabah and seven divisions in Sarawak.
“The objective of having the different levels of competition is all about scouting for talents at the grassroots level,” said Jude.
“This is the best way of finding talent across Malaysia. We start as early as six months ahead so that we have very incredible representatives from Malaysia.”
Regarding the permissible age range for the contestants, Jude said that it is 18 to 28 years old according to the standard rule.
The other rules to meet the international requirements are: the contestants must be single, never married or divorced or have children.
On the galore of beauty pageants with different standards such as Ms and Mr Chubby, Ms and Mr Cute as well as Ms and Mr Petite, Jude said, “To me, I guess at the end of the day, it depends on the objectives of the pageants.
“The organisers come up with different contests due to various reasons such as business objectives, community service, etc.
“My sincere hope is that whatever beauty pageants are held, they ought to be done with sincerity.”
