The recently held Miss USA 2022 contest has been at the centre of controversy since its finale. Here’s what happened. After Miss Texas R’Bonney Gabriel was crowned the title, she walked forward to greet the crowd and then walked back to the centre stage. It was then that the other participants began to leave, without congratulating her. Their accusation – the contest was rigged.
According to The Washington Post, Gabriel was the first Filipino American to win the title of Miss USA. But the other contestants have accused the Miss USA organization of “preferential treatment”. Since then, Miss USA’s umbrella corporation, ‘Miss Brands’ which is run by Crystle Stewart, has been suspended by the Miss Universe Organization.
In light of all this, Miss Barbados 2000 and now YouTuber Leilani has thrown serious allegations against Priyanka Chopra and the Miss World 2000 competition. She claims that the competition in 2000 was rigged as well, reports Hindustan Times.
She took to her YouTube channel, which has a couple of thousand subscribers, to talk about the controversy surrounding Miss USA 2022 and said that this incident reminded her of Mis World 2000, where she was a contestant. She said that because Zee TV was one of the main sponsors for the competition, the organization let Priyanka Chopra win.
“I literally went through the same thing at Miss World. I was Miss Barbados, and the year I went, Miss India won. Mind you, Miss India had won the previous year (Yukta Mookhey), the sponsor was also Zee TV, an Indian cable station. Our sashes had ZeeTV on top and then the names of our countries. This is very familiar to me,” Leilani claimed.
She further alleged that PeeCee was very unlikeable and was on the receiving end of massive favouritism. Indian Express quoted her citing examples wherein she claimed:
“Priyanka Chopra was the only person who was allowed to keep her sarong on. Apparently, she was using some skin tone cream to even out her skin tone, and it was still splotchy. I’m not saying that it was a bleaching cream, it was a skin tone cream. And it didn’t work, so she didn’t want to remove her sarong. So, during the actual judgement, she’s literally in a dress… If you’re a contestant in a pageant and somebody favours you, what will you do about it? Why wouldn’t you go along with it?”
“Priyanka Chopra didn’t even go to rehearsals, and she didn’t go to morning meals. It was brought to her in her bed… Priyanka Chopra had absolute press calls by herself, that nobody else went to… Nobody else in the Asian region, nobody else was ever called for these press calls… During the contest, before she won, she had these pictures of her walking on the beach. Meanwhile, we’re all grouped together in this sandpit… The designer who designed her gown also designed all of our gowns. Our gowns were basically mini bride gowns of her gown. And the gowns fit like crap, by the way. Her gown was immaculate,” she added.
She finally claimed, “At Miss World, everyone knew that Priyanka Chopra was going to win and that it was rigged.”
You can watch her full video here.
What are your views on these accusations?