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South African Satire

Issue 8,  April 2004

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Miss India SA Competition Expands To Incorporate Others
DURBAN – The Miss India SA Company, owners of the South African Miss India South Africa beauty pageant franchise, have decided to expand the pageant by opening it up to people of other ethnic backgrounds. The new pageant format will see a Miss Europe SA, Miss Africa SA and a Miss Miscellaneous SA to cater for all the women of South Africa.

missIndia.jpg (10155 bytes)Company director, Ritesh Jinabhai, said that the company was responding to criticism that its pageant was too racially exclusive, and, at the same time it was taking advantage of an opportunity to grow the business.

“The new format will now give women with European and African descent a chance to compete for their very own crown. For women of mixed descent we have the Miscellaneous category, or Miss Misc as we like to call it. We would like to stress at the outset that there will be no favouritism - the different pageants will be separate but equal. So, nobody can say we are being racist anymore”, said Jinabhai.

Meanwhile, other beauty pageant organisers have not viewed the change with the same enthusiasm. Miss South Africa spokesperson, Anthony Pienaar, remained critical of the new pageants: “I always thought it was bad to have a competition for one ethnic group, but this just smacks of Apartheid-style thinking. How are they going to prove their ethnic backgrounds? Will we see the comb-test coming back?”

Jinabhai dismissed Pienaar’s claims as based on “jealousy over the fact that we are stealing some of their limelight.”

Tammy Klein, a frequent entrant in beauty pageants and bikini competitions, has stated that the new development is quite good for the local pageant industry. “Well, like everyone knows beauty is in the eye of the cup-holder, so it’s not really fair to compare black girls and white girls. They’re like apples and oranges. When a black girl like wins, you never know if it’s because the judges liked her, or they just wanted a black girl to win. In the new system, I will only have to compete with other white girls and then we can really tell who’s the prettiest”, said Klein.

TV stations are reportedly already bidding for the broadcast rights for the first show to be screened later this year.

“If this works here, we will expand the concept to cover the entire world”, said Jinabhai

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