Ms T&T takes on Ms Universe execs

Derek Achong

Tue Oct 09 2018

Flashback: Miss Universe Trinidad and Tobago, Martrecia Alleyne, left, first runner-up Yvonne Clarke and second runner-up Glenisca Wilson pose for a picture after the pageant at the Cascadia Hotel, St Ann’s, in 2017.↔picture: indianandworldpageant.com
Flashback: Miss Universe Trinidad and Tobago, Martrecia Alleyne, left, first runner-up Yvonne Clarke and second runner-up Glenisca Wilson pose for a picture after the pageant at the Cascadia Hotel, St Ann’s, in 2017.↔picture: indianandworldpageant.com

There is yet an­oth­er con­tro­ver­sy sur­round­ing this coun­try’s par­tic­i­pa­tion in the Miss Uni­verse com­pe­ti­tion.

In Sep­tem­ber, Martre­cia Al­leyne sued the Unit­ed States-based Miss Uni­verse Or­gan­i­sa­tion and for­mer lo­cal fran­chise hold­er Jen­ny Dou­glas in her bid to rep­re­sent this coun­try in this year’s pageant, which will be held in Bangkok, Thai­land, on De­cem­ber 17.

Al­leyne, who was the run­ner-up in last year’s lo­cal qual­i­fi­ca­tion pageant, was of­fered the op­por­tu­ni­ty to par­tic­i­pate in this year’s com­pe­ti­tion fol­low­ing the con­tro­ver­sy in­volv­ing last year’s del­e­gate Yvonne Clarke.

In Oc­to­ber last year, Clarke was dis­qual­i­fied by Dou­glas be­fore be­ing even­tu­al­ly re­in­stat­ed af­ter threat­en­ing a law­suit.

Al­leyne was giv­en the op­por­tu­ni­ty to par­tic­i­pate in this year’s com­pe­ti­tion, as she had spent a con­sid­er­able amount of time and ef­fort in ob­tain­ing spon­sors be­fore she was in­formed that Clarke had re­solved her dis­pute with Dou­glas.

Her prepa­ra­tions in­clud­ed an en­dorse­ment deal and char­i­ty work in con­junc­tion with the Chil­dren’s Au­thor­i­ty and the Alzheimer’s As­so­ci­a­tion.

Dou­glas was even­tu­al­ly stripped of the fran­chise and Al­leyne was in­formed that the or­gan­i­sa­tion could not ho­n­our her nom­i­na­tion.

But Al­leyne had ap­plied for an in­junc­tion stop­ping the in­ter­na­tion­al or­gan­i­sa­tion, for­mer­ly owned by US Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump, from se­lect­ing a re­place­ment.

When the case came up for hear­ing be­fore Jus­tice Frank Seep­er­sad at the Hall of Jus­tice in Port-of-Spain yes­ter­day morn­ing Seep­er­sad dis­missed the in­junc­tion ap­pli­ca­tion, as he stat­ed that he was not pre­pared to in­junct the in­ter­na­tion­al or­gan­i­sa­tion.

How­ev­er, Seep­er­sad sug­gest­ed that Al­leyne may have a cause of ac­tion against Dou­glas for breach of con­tract and that fi­nan­cial com­pen­sa­tion may be more suit­able than seek­ing to com­pel the or­gan­i­sa­tion to in­clude Al­leyne.

Al­leyne’s lawyer Josi­ah Soo Hon re­ject­ed that sug­ges­tion though, as he point­ed out that he was cur­rent­ly in ne­go­ti­a­tions with the or­gan­i­sa­tion to am­i­ca­bly re­solve the claim.

Seep­er­sad ex­pressed hope that the ne­go­ti­a­tions would be suc­cess­ful and agreed to ad­journ the sub­stan­tive case un­til they were com­plet­ed.

As reg­is­tra­tion and prepa­ra­tion for the com­pe­ti­tion is sched­uled to start to­day Al­leyne has a lim­it­ed time to re­solve the dis­pute, oth­er­wise T&T may not have a rep­re­sen­ta­tive.

T&T has copped the ti­tle twice in the com­pe­ti­tion’s over 60-year his­to­ry, first in 1977 with Janelle Com­mis­siong and again in 1998 with Wendy Fitzwilliam. The com­pe­ti­tion was held in Trinidad in 1999 and was won by Mpule Kwe­lagobe of Botswana.

http://www.guardian.co.tt/news/ms-tt-takes-on-ms-universe-execs-6.2.687384.aeb0cfa6e8