Miss Universe Fiji Media Release.
Miss Universe Fiji (MUF) states that it will not endorse or support the vote stacking that occurred at this year’s national competition, held in late August in Fiji. And the disgraced event organizer, whose client in Manshika Prasad was wrongly announced as the winner on the night, is not the chosen winner by MUF nor endorsed or selected by Miss Universe Fiji.
“The public expects honesty and transparency, yet despite the vote stacking by the terminated event organizer to have his client installed in Manshika Prasad as the winner to represent Fiji in the 2024 competition, MUF states it refuses to endorse cheating, and Manshika Prassad is not the winner nominated by MUF.”
If the Miss Universe Organization fails to condone such action and supports vote stacking at a national level, it can only raise questions of the legitimacy of voting at the yearly Miss Universe finals to be held this year in Mexico shortly.
Although it’s commercially more viable to ensure a Fiji Indian candidate wins for a larger global TV audience, if this was the goal all along, then non-Fiji Indian candidates should have been informed of such biases before the national competition started. MUF doesn’t support such biases.
The voting stacking saga caused by the disgraced event manager to install his client as the winner, whereby he chose all judges, bar one, from family, friends, and associates, to stack the result in his client’s favor, should never have occurred.
Some judges even went on TV afterwards and inavertently disclosed their clear bias towards installing his client as the winner, when they are meant to display impartiality at all times. But as they were chosen to be biased by the disgraced event organizer, this wasn’t unexpected.
Miss Universe Fiji refuses to provide any more funding towards a candidate who was wrongly chosen and may seek legal compensation from Miss Universe Head Office for costs incurred to date and damage to the brand due to the failure to resolve the matter fairly.
Even if Manshika Prassad was to win without vote stacking, it has been observed that her behavior, ever since the national finals in Fiji, including threats against the organization and another contestant, would have seen her dethroned regardless.
The Miss Universe brand and the Fiji brand have been damaged over the voting saga, and the Miss Universe Head Office should have not simply taken an option that’s commercially more viable but actually taken the time to have reviewed the in-depth investigation that showed clearly the disgraced event organizers deception and vote stacking to have his client wrongly installed.
Miss Universe Fiji apologizes to contestants and the rightful winner in Nadine Roberts for the drama and stress endured by an unnecessary saga.
We hope that this brings change to the Global Organization to adhere to higher standards of voting transparency and, when voting irregularities are found, to ensure they are not supported and to ensure fairness to avoid repeats of such practices.