30 African Queens Battle For Supremacy In Calabar

SAN FRANCISCO, November 18, (THEWILL) – Beauty queens invited from 30 African countries have arrived at the Margaret Ekpo International Airport, Calabar, to participate in the maiden edition of the 'Miss Africa Beauty Pageant' organised by the Cross River Government.

The Pageant with the theme: 'Climate Change' is aimed at drawing global attention to issues of climate change and related environmental issues.

Addressing newsmen shortly on arrival from Morocco, Governor of Cross River State, Ben Ayade, revealed that the pageant was a new addition to the state's vast tourism offerings.

Ayade who was in Morocco for the just-concluded UN conference of parties (COP 22) in Marrakech explained that the climate change summit in Morocco was consistent with this year's Carnival Calabar theme.

“The pageant is a warm embrace to Africa and more importantly, to create a platform to discuss the fate of Africans,” he said.

“The Miss Africa Beauty Pageant is a platform for the expression of intellectualism, capacity, unity, strength, vitality and the energy Africa represents.

“The showpiece is to create an avenue to celebrate the great splendour and beauty that God has given to Africa in terms of beauty, resilience in character and natural resources.

“God has over-endowed Africa and for that, Africans have been a bit over indulged.

“This is a wake-up call for us to begin to galvanise and maximally harness these great potential for the benefit and well-being of our people.

“The time has come where Africans will have to sit to discuss the fate of a black man, come together as a continent and deal with their issues themselves.

“We don't have to depend on other continents to teach us how to conserve sun for solar energy or use the wings for energy generation and that Africa can indeed drive Africa.

“Some of the key issues we focused as a state were on conservation of our forest. I am just back from Morocco where the whole world focused on climate change so, it is consistent with this year's carnival theme.

“The focus was on adaptation, conservation and mitigation which were some of the very critical areas this administration is focusing on.

“We started by setting up the Green Police to focus on policing and sustenance of our people and more importantly the forest resources.

“There is deliberate effort to ensure that those whose livelihoods have been dislocated from continuous dependence on forest will now have alternative platform to express their yearnings.”

Story by Oputah David