LAST Saturday made it four times lucky for the year for reigning Miss World Guyana and former Miss Guyana Universe, Ruqayyah Boyer, when she copped the Best Newcomer Actress Award at the Theatre Guild One-Act Film Festival Awards Ceremony.

In July, shortly after earning the second national title of Miss World Guyana, and hence becoming the first Miss Guyana in the local history of the pageant to hold both titles simultaneously, Ms Boyer was sashed and awarded the title of Ambassador for the Caribbean American Domestic Violence Awareness Group.

In her quest to become the next Miss World, Ms Boyer left Guyana to train in Trinida11d and then the United States, where she was again recognized and given a City Citation Award by the People of New York. Before she departed for Indonesia, the award/certificate was handed over to her by Councilman Reuben Wills of New York, who congratulated her on her work on various causes, addressed issues such as Domestic Violence, Bullying and other social ills affecting not only persons in Guyana, but in the United States as well.

During the Miss World pageant, the ambassador’s ‘beauty with a purpose’ project was one of the celebrated projects virtually to win the said segment, but fell short of the prize, with Miss Nepal’s project, ‘Smile’ taking the title of Best Beauty with a Purpose presentation, and hence landing Miss Nepal in the Miss World top 10 finals.

This, however, did not stop Miss World Guyana queen from amassing one of the largest followings at Miss World, along with Miss Philippines, who she was very close with and seen captured in many video logs on Miss Guyana’s World Multimedia fan page.

Many of the fans globally now refer to her as Rocky the fighter, as she continued onwards to place in the Miss World top 33 Beach Fashion and Talent Semi Finals.

After competing for one month in Indonesia, Boyer then returned to Guyana in October to hand over her Miss Universe title, leaving her with just the current title of Miss World Guyana. She most recently received her fourth award for the year, for her exemplary work in pageantry, by the Linden Community from which she hails. At a ceremony held at the Mackenzie Sports Club ground last Saturday, the event saw awardees such as regional Chairman Sharma Solomon, Sports Journalist Rawle Toney, GT&T Jingle and Song Winners Malaika Boyd and Brandon Harding, among a list of other nominees.

Boyer is the current cover girl of one of the Caribbean’s most celebrated magazines, ‘Shabeau’, alongside Barbadian superstar Alison Hinds, who is also featured on the double cover. Ms Boyer’s featured story can be accessed here. The beauty queen is also currently featured in a Bahamian magazine called NU Woman, which covers the life of female Bahamian overachievers and Caribbean women at large.
In a recent interview with this newspaper, Miss World Guyana said that although she feels very blessed and is most happy about her recent achievement, since it was her hometown and their support which propelled her to try and land her previous Miss Guyana Universe title, she is now still happy to have another national title, which allows her to focus on her platform of Domestic Violence and Bullying.

Ms Boyer said she is currently planning to pull off her second “Flight of Phoenix Apron Walk against Domestic Violence”, which was first held last year October under her Miss Guyana Universe reign. The march is scheduled to take place on November 30, and would commence from the Parliament Building at 6 am and conclude at the National Library, where a short programme will be held.
Written By Alex Wayne