Miss Dominica Tasia Floissac emerged the winner of the 55th Annual Jaycees International Queen Show on Sunday evening at Carnival City. The Dominican beauty outshone 10 other contestants and dominated most of the judged segments. At the end of the night she was adjudged best in swimsuit, talent and interview segments, and also copped most photogenic.
Antigua & Barbuda’s Leanda-Ann Norville was adjudged 1st runner-up, while Miss Nevis Akiesha Fergus took the 2nd runner-up position. Norville walked away with the best evening wear and modelling skills categories, with Fergus winning the ‘True to the Team’ award.
Miss Congeniality went to Orngel Erskine from St Kitts. The other contestants hailed from Trinidad & Tobago, St Vincent & the Grenadines, Barbados, United States Virgin Islands, Montserrat, St Lucia, and United States of America.
The winner was chosen from the final five contestants as part of the competition’s format. Dominica, Antigua & Barbuda, St Kitts, Nevis and USA made it to the finals. Appearing on OBSERVER AM hours after being crowned Miss Jaycees International 2016, Floissac expressed her elation on winning the coveted title.
“I think it’s now sinking in. After a few minutes I said to myself ‘I won, I won!’ I feel awesome. I’m ecstatic. I looked at that beautiful crown, and I said to myself, ‘my team and I did it’,” she said.
She said competing in recent pageants prepared her for this year’s show and pointed to the real challenge she had to overcome.“I did my local pageant and I did Miss Caraval just last week. I think the challenge is to really outdo yourself to make sure you correct any errors from previous pageants. I had to cope with balancing my job and practices, getting in those late night sessions and having to go to work as well,” she added.
Jaycees committee member Brenda Albert, who also appeared on OBSERVER AM, spoke about the theme that encompassed this year’s competition. “This particular focus, JCI Antigua started the cancer awareness concept in 2009. We had a few members that sadly passed away from cancer and of course family and friends.
“We wanted to raise some awareness. We always said that the Jaycees Queen Show isn’t only about pageants and beauty; it’s also about educating our young ladies and the public. So we decided to choose cancer because it’s so prevalent and so many young people are dying from cancer today,” she said.
In the meantime, this year’s winner said she endorsed the theme and welcomed the opportunity to learn more about the deadly disease and assist in promoting cancer awareness. “I thought it was a great theme. Platforms like these really push us as delegates to learn and research more. I was quite surprised it was cancer, and I realised then that I don’t know as much as I thought.
“Usually you hear of breast cancer but when I spoke to the other young ladies, I found out so many different varieties of the disease, so I think what the JCI is doing is very significant especially for our region,” she added.
Outside of competing in pageants, Floissac works at the Dominica Broadcasting Station (DBS) as a news reporter.
Miss Leslassa Armour Shillingford was the last delegate from Dominica to win Miss Jaycees in 2013. Kaeve Armstrong from St Kitts & Nevis won in 2014, while Miss Sharissa Ryan from Montserrat was crowned the winner last year.