Gaelebale Finally Gets Crown After Five Years
Dumisani Ncube | Tuesday October 3, 2017 19:00
The 26-years-old was crowned queen at the University of Botswana Indoor Sports Centre with Uua Murangi named second princess and Neelo Ntobatsang winning the first princess crown. In total, the pageant had 12 hopefuls battling it out for the crown.
Gaelebale’s win came as a surprise as many people had thought she did not deserve the crown due to a number of reasons. A number of people within the audience anticipated that Murangi would be queen while some felt Gaelebale’s response to the question and answer segment was not solid enough.
The pageant started off with contestants parading on stage on different categories such as casual, swim and evening wear donning outfits by local designers House of Kay and Botocy.
On stage, the women presented well-choreographed catwalk routines with some of them being experienced models who had no stage fright. Others had challenges, but they later gained confidence.
After different parades the contestants went through an elimination round that saw Khumo Leburu, Modioki Gaborone, Murangi, Ntobatsang and Gaelebale being selected into the top five. They were asked a number of questions and gave different responses.
This was followed by another elimination round that saw Leburu and Gaborone being eliminated.
The remaining three were asked a similar question, which stated, “If the reigning queen were to get pregnant while in office should she be dethroned?” This is the same question that Mpule Kwelakgobe was asked in 1999 and it sparked a lot of controversy on social media platforms.
Both Murangi and Ntobatsang’s responses stated that the queen could continue representing the country as Miss Botswana despite being pregnant. Whereas Gaelebale stated that if the reigning queen falls pregnant while in office she should be dethroned because Miss Botswana’s role is to serve the nation as a mother of the country therefore if she falls pregnant she would have failed her duties as mother of the nation.
After evaluating the answers, the judges selected Gaelebale as Miss Botswana. They stated that the selection for the winner was not only based on their performance during the grand finale but was also based on the candidates’ performance during the bootcamp period. In a twist of events, when the queen was crowned she was not handed her cheque for the prize money and the prize money was not announced on stage. On the day of the pageant it was still not revealed as to how much the prize money would be.
However, a day after the pageant Miss Botswana coordinator Dorcas Thobega told Showtime that the queen is scheduled to receive a grand prize of P160,000.
“I really don’t understand why the MC did not announce the prizes on stage during the grand finale,” Thobega said.
After trying her luck since the Emma Wareus era in 2010, the 26-year-old was excited about her win. “This time around I actually had fun. I was myself. As contestants we try too hard to be perfect and then we try to portray something we are not. It was a dream come true and it’s amazing because I worked hard for it,” Gaelebale said after being crowned.
Production standards of the extravaganza were up to par, but the pageant in general was not impressive with a low turnout, especially in the general stand that made appear empty.