Thursday, 23 February 2012 23:26

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Panama is a central American nation whose beauty tradition may not be as strong as the rest of Latin American nation but nevertheless managed to score some points with an occasional semifinalist or a runner-up. The political instability and the strong conservative Catholicism prevalent in its mid-century history has curtailed the growth of pageantry in the country and at times prevented Panama from being represented.

At Miss Universe, Panama has a winner, Yostin "Justine" Pasek (2002), who originally is the first runner-up but went on to take the crown after the original winner was dethroned. In addition to that Panama has a top 6 (1997), a top 10 (2011) and five semifinalists (1953, 1954, 1974, 1980, 2003). Due largely to its colorful culture and innovative designers, the country has won 4 Best in National Costume Awards (1986, 2004, 2009, 2011). This makes Panama as the third most awarded country when it comes to National Costumes, tied with Korea and Brazil.

At Miss World, Panama has only two semifinalists (1979, 1986) but amazingly has two 5th runners-up (1983, 2009).

Miss International is the country's forte. It boasts a winner in the name of Lia Victoria Borrero (1998), a first runner-up (2006), a second runner-up (1962), a 4th runner-up (2011) and three semifinalists (1961, 1984, 2009). It also won the Best National Costume Award in 2006.

Panama has only one semifinalist at Miss Earth and she's Stefanie de Roux (the very same girl who was a Miss Universe semifinalist in 2003) but can be proud of two Best in National Costume Awards (2003, 2008)

Fast Facts about Panama

Number of Big4 winners: 2

2010 Big4 Rank: 41

2011 Big4 Rank: 40

Panama can be proud of the fact that it won the Best in National Costume Awards in 3 Big4 pageants that dispenses the award - twice at Miss Earth, once at Miss International and four times at Miss Universe

Miss Earth 2003 Best in National Costume Jessica Segui

Miss Earth 2008 Best in National Costume Shassia Unillus

Miss Universe 2011 Best in National Costume Sheldry Saez

Miss Universe 2009 Best in National Costume Diana Broce

Miss Universe 2004 Best in National Costume Jessica Rodriguez

Miss Universe 1986 Best in National Costume Gilda Garcia

Miss International 2006 Best in National Costume Mayte Sanchez

List of Panamanian Delegates at Big4 pageants

Pride of Panama

Miss International 1996 and Miss Universe 1996 Top 6 Lia Victoria Borrero

Miss Universe 2002 Justine Pasek

Panama has several entities and organizations that selected Panamanian representatives to the Big4 Pageants. Señorita Panama, Miss Panama and Miss World Panama contests had been sending delegates to international pageants namely, Miss World and Miss Universe, with franchises being passed with one another in several instances. Miss Panama International, Miss International Panama and Miss Earth Panama, as the respective organization's name suggests, specialized in sending delegates to Miss International and Miss Earth.

Stefanie de Roux competed at both Miss Universe (left) and Miss Earth (right). In both instances she made it to the semis

Panama had seen the decline of its pageantry tradition in recent years with public interest waning and participation rate became dismal. In 2008, efforts to arouse public interest led the organizers to make the contest in selecting their Miss Universe rep a reality show ala-Big Brother style. In 2009, the same format was followed but poor turn-out during the casting made the entire idea a huge failure.

Carolina Dementiev is Missosology's If Only She Was There girl at Miss Universe 2008. A strong contestant that for some reason did not make it to the semis

This year, all the Big4 representatives will be selected only from a single pageant. The franchise holders have consolidated their efforts in order to select 4 worthy women to compete at Miss Universe, Miss World, Miss International and Miss Earth. The Top 10 finish of Sheldry Saez at Miss Universe 2011 perhaps ushered this initiative and inspired many women to participate.

Panama is a country with lots of potentials yet because of poor public interest and lack of a strong organization hampered the progress of pageantry in the country. This perhaps best summarizes on what is the true standing of this Latin American country in the world of beauty pageants

Wednesday, 22 February 2012 21:57

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UPDATE: Las Vegas Sun removed the article for several hours and decided to put it back on but this time removed the our name, Missosology, from the article. Missosology is NOT the obscure website that the article is referring to as neither Missosology is an obscure entity nor is the one who spread the false story.

Las Vegas Sun through its writer Robin Leach reported that Missosology.Org - describing us as an obscure Indonesian website - spread a false news that NBC dropped Miss Universe and Miss USA due to poor ratings. Unfortunately, it was a false news as well. Missosology.Org NEVER reported this and such false news NEVER appeared at Missosology.Org. But the damage has been done. The Las Vegas Sun reporter already told the Miss Universe President Paula Shugart that it was Missosology who started the malicious false news. 

So what really happened? In a clear breach of journalism ethics, Robin Leach picked up a post by a forumer at the official forum of Missosology.Org, which is Missosology.Info, containing the false news. He did not bother to read the whole thread where many other forumers refuted the news and called it as a hoax. The forumer picked it up from Latin American forums and reposted it for the sake of discussion. Clearly, Mr. Leach does not know the nature of a forum. Even more apparent is that no one verified the facts before they run the story. They only verified it AFTER they published the false news. 

To defend our integrity, Missosology told the Las Vegas Sun to remove the news otherwise legal action will be undertaken. Kudos to the editorial board of the newspaper, the malicious news was removed minutes after they were informed of the situation.

The news however served as a fodder for those insecure and clearly defeated detractors of Missosology. Those who do not honor dissent or public opinions but style themselves as "reputable". But who couldn't forget the Bahamas-will-host-Miss-Universe-2012 brouhaha? If anything, they are the ones spreading the false news not us. [In fairness to them, they deleted the news after they had their Mr. Leach moment]

It has never been  the policy of Missosology to spread false news and people should know that official opinions and news are published at Missosology.ORG and that opinions, how outlandish they may be*, are tolerated in our forum at Missosology.INFO [*restrictions apply] and such opinions are sole responsibility of the forumer who posted it and in no way reflects the official thought and position of Missosology.