Miss Africa Mizzou crowned

ASA hopes to make African students feel more connected to MU.

By Gregory Zajac

Published Nov. 10, 2009

The African Students Association crowned Stephine Nwaneri the first Miss Africa Mizzou on Sunday.

Miss Africa Mizzou Pageant Coordinator Patricia Vewenda-Mabengo said she felt something was missing from the ASA calendar when she first started at MU. She said she began working with an idea for an event that would involve the community and present a different side to Africa with which most Americans are not familiar, which eventually became the pageant.

"I wanted to do something light and fun about Africa for the campus of Mizzou," Vewenda-Mabengo said. "Although I do use the show to educate on different platforms, I wanted people to come and see Africa for its beauty and not have to solely talk about wars, poverty, diseases and failing economies."

In September, ASA women were invited to try out for the pageant. Vewenda-Mabengo said about 10 girls came to an informational meeting and the potential participants gradually withdrew from the pageant until the four contestants who finally competed were left.

"It just happened that the girls that did decide to actually go through with it, were all from different countries, so we didn't have to cut or choose girls," Vewenda-Mabengo said.

The four who decided to compete in the pageant were sophomore Kiarah Moore, representing Liberia; sophomore Stephine Nwaneri, representing Nigeria; freshman Yohana Ghirmazion, representing Eritrea; and freshman Mrembo Palai, representing Tanzania.

In the time leading up the pageant, the contestants participated in fundraisers, community service and rehearsals.

"We had practices two times a week, each practice was about three hours," Nwaneri said. "I had to really balance my time management as well."

Vewenda-Mabengo said the contestants competed in the categories of evening attire, talent segment, traditional attire and a question and answer session. Judges were told to pay special attention to creativity, individuality, relevance to African culture and intellectual mind frame.

Christopher Okonkwo, ASA adviser and associate professor of English and African Diaspora, Language Resource Laboratory coordinator Jenifer Pilz and International Admissions Evaluator Chidimma Agwu-Jones were judges.

The pageant began at 6:30 p.m. in Stotler Lounge with a pre-show performance by Universal Drum Appeal, followed by a slideshow about the contestants and what they had to do leading up to the pageant.

At 7 p.m., the contestants came on stage and performed a dance wearing skirts patterned after the flags of the countries they represented and gave short speeches introducing themselves and their platforms to the audience.

The contestants came on stage again in formal eveningwear.

In the talent portion of the pageant, all four contestants danced. Moore and Nwaneri also recited poems they wrote.

"I want to be seen," Nwaneri said. "I want to step out of the darkness. I want to show everybody what type of Nigerian I am. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but someday, will be my day."

Then the contestants appeared onstage again, this time sporting traditional African dresses.

While still in their African dresses, the contestants stepped up to the microphone to present their platform for the evening, where they were supposed to address a serious issue facing the people of their home country and Africans today. Ghirmazion, who spoke first, discussed inflation and how the increases in prices make it difficult for families in Eritrea to buy necessities.

Palai spoke about how preventative health care could improve the quality of life in Africa. She put emphasis on educating the public on how to keep healthy as a realistic solution to the health problems in Africa.

Nwaneri's speech also focused on health care with a focus on sanitation as a preventative measure to prevent to spread of malaria and AIDS.

Moore spoke about female circumcision and genital mutilation from a multicultural perspective and promoted understanding and tolerance of this controversial practice.

"There are a lot of reasons why a lot of women undergo this procedure," Moore said. "It makes them more pure, it reduces sexual desire, therefore reducing infidelity and then prevent vaginal cancer. Culturalism, on the other hand, is the breakdown of culture and understanding that there are no objective standards to any one belief."

After an intermission, an AEISEC presentation and performances by Les Belles de KU and No Genre, both groups of University of Kansas students who contributed to the pageant, and deliberation by the judges, awards were announced.

"ASA has not done anything this big, and this spectacular, in a couple years," ASA President Chimereze Oji said. "So this event has brought people from outside the community, in the community, entertained the community and also help the community with the fundraising aspect of it."

Oji said the event benefited the university by making MU more diverse.

"Because, if an African group has an African event like this and they can have a different kind of event, like the Asian events, it makes them feel that MU is not only a one-sided campus, it's diverse, it has different cultures, different people at MU and it makes more students want to come here," Oji said.