Undergraduate wins N1m in Queen Varsity Afrika pageant
Kossy Okonkwo, 22-year-old Computer Technology student of Yaba College of Technology, has emerged winner in the 2019 edition of Queen Varsity Afrika beauty pageant.
The Enugu State- born beauty queen beat four contestants out of a total of 17 on Sunday, July 28, 2019 to emerge the new queen.
This year’s pageant tagged “The search for Beauty plus Brains”, searched for beauty and brains where many Africa female undergraduates and fresh graduates engaged in intellectual battles. There were 17 contestants from 13 higher institutions including a university from Benin Republic.
The event was well attended by Lagos State Ministry of Women Affairs and Poverty Alleviation, Brazil Consulate in Lagos and Federal University of Agriculture Abeokuta (FUNAAB).
Jasmine Ofoegbu, execu
tive producer, Queen Varsity Afrika beauty pageant, said, “The Queen Varsity Afrika pageant is an empowerment project for the girl -child. Our focus is to groom and educate the girl-child in order to educate the nation.
“This is the maiden edition supported by my financial savings as this is a 10-year dream that I am passionate about and finally it is coming true. We thank FUNAAB for allowing us to camp in their beautiful facility and for allowing us to use most of their resources during the course of production”.
She also thanked, Olusegun Obasanjo, ex-president of Nigeria, for being part of the edition and for taking out his time to mentor the contestants on several issues including good citizen and how to run a business.
The five finalists tagged “Princesses” which comprised of three undergraduates and two graduates were asked tough questions by the two judges; Melvin Orji, CEO, Talkative Africa Media and Mallami Adeseun, CEO, BlvckhairNigeria, to showcase intellectual capabilities.
Tonia Ifekandu, a student of Mass Communications from National Open University, emerged the fifth runner up, Arewa Omoye, a student of History and International Relations from Ekiti State University, was the fourth runner up, Joy Nwosu, a graduate of nursing from la Cite University Benin Republic was 2nd runner up, and Oruscilla Falola, graduate of Physics from FUNAAB was the 1st runner up.
The winner and the runners up were legible to attend empowerment seminars and certifications within and outside Africa.
“As the queen and face of Queen Varsity Afrika, I am going to make sure the show goes far. It is an avenue for me to market myself and my company, KOWORLD, a tech company that embodies other businesses and K-tech, a school that will help in raising more women in tech as Africa lacks female technologists”, Kossy said.