Africa’s Next Supermodel Botswana on the cards
Ayoung local professional model who is also a director for different beauty pageants, Kefentse Gokganwang will be hosting Africa’s Next Supermodel Botswana competition.
Gokganwang told Arts & Culture that the main objective of the competition is to reflect pride in the African roots and promote African models internationally. She explained that they intended to create a platform for African models of the Africa origin at the world stage.
She added that as much as there were runway opportunities that came in the form of fashion shows, she felt that the industry still lacked a platform that could expose models to the world stage.
The model targets aspiring female models between the ages of 17 and 25. Gokganwang said the contestants must be single and had never been married, never given birth and never been convicted of any crime.
“It is not enough to do modeling locally. I feel models need this opportunity because it can help them penetrate international modeling industry. Models are so excited to have this opportunity. They believe it will help them to go at least a step ahead from where they are. To them this opportunity is a stepping-stone to success.
The majority of models I have already met through this competition are in a comfort zone,” said Gokganwang.
“Some assume that being a model alone is enough and they neglected certain things that are important for their own personal development and career, which I believe by the end of this competition, they will have worked and improved on. I have met models that can be good on the runway or have the image that we are looking for but public speaking wise and other aspects that contribute to one be-*
ing a complete brand are lacking. Models are not taken seriously in Botswana. Some agents were only in the industry to manipulate models and take advantage of their eagerness to make it in the industry,” she said.
Furthermore, Gokganwang explained that she believes that the way they structured the entire programme of the competition would be an awakening call for models to keep on improving themselves and keep up their standards.
She said there would be various events before the grand finale and awards night. Those include Online Voting that is divided into categories namely the website voting where they would be uploading photos on their pageant vote website and the participant with the highest voted would be awarded the Best Photo Model.
There would also be Social Media Voting that started on Wednesday this week where videos have been uploaded on different social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and YouTube. The model with the highest votes would be given the Best Media Influencer Award at the grand finale. Other stages of the competition include the High Fashion Photoshoot where they would be testing contestants’ ability to work in front of the camera. It is scheduled for October 22, 2022.
She added that they would also have National Arts and Cultural Festival, which was part of the eligibility requirements to compete internationally, where the country’s representative was expected to be well versed about her national culture and environmental concerns. She said the festival would test the models knowledge about culture and environmental concerns. She added that two models that surpass others would be given the Best Cultural Presentation and Best Environmental Presentation awards.
The Grand Finale Night and Award Ceremony is scheduled for December 3, 2022, which is the last stage of the competition. The winner would be prepared for an international competition that would be held in the Seychelles on March 9, 2023.