Her heart gradually sank as she watched four of the top five contestants stepping ahead.
She struggled to catch her breath as her heartbeat let off a trickle of sweat on her forehead. Only a single chance was left and she was beginning to panic.
She was on the edge of another disheartening loss. And then, her contestant number was called out.
She sighed in relief and took a step forward. A soft yell escaped her lips as she closed her eyes and looked up to the heavens in a thankful gesture.Elizabeth Ganda had just made it into the top five for the Miss Zimbabwe national final. That was in 2001.
Although she did not make it to the final three of the contest that year, Ganda still values her achievement as one of the major highlights of her modelling career.
She has other colourful achievements under her belt that include being crowned Miss Mashonaland Central and Miss Malaika Mashonaland Central at the turn of the millennium.
But unlike other models, she has refused to be pushed off the modelling industry because of age.
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When she quit the ramp, she made sure she contributed something to the industry through grooming aspiring models.
Now she is a licence holder for Miss Tourism Mashonaland Central.
“As a former beauty queen, I realised that one can never be a model forever.
“You grow older and there is need to have a broad mind so as to be able to sustain yourself in such a competitive world,” Ganda said.
She reckons that models from her province have not made much impact at national level but this year she has promised to turn the tables.
Ganda says Mashonaland Central will certainly be a force to reckon with in the upcoming Miss Tourism Zimbabwe national finals next month.
Her contestants in the finals would be Miss Mashonaland Central queen, Ayeta Sesemane Banda, the first princess, Nokuthula DeSouza and second princess, Melissa Chikerema.
Ganda, who became the pageant licence holder in 2009 after having formerly been the provincial organiser for Miss Bindura pageant under the Miss Zimbabwe Trust, said her dream was to empower models on and off the ramp.
She was also the organiser of the Miss Shamva pageant from 2001 to 2008.
Ganda said if models learnt versatile skills from the beginning of their careers it would be easier for them to start their own businesses or study for other careers rather than focus solely on modelling.
“I want to change the general perception that these beauties can only be successful if they hang on to successful men.
“This year I have trained my contestants on various life skills and a number of experts have imparted knowledge to my team through various workshops and some models have already started running personal projects.
“This month my models held a cocktail party at Mayfair Lodges in Bindura where they invited influential people in the community to help them launch a programme of action for their development activities in Mashonaland Central.”
She said such program-mes had given the contestants a lot of self confidence adding that they were likely to do better than their predecessors at the national finals.
