NIGERIA’s representative at the 71st Miss World competition, Ada Eme, has earned an automatic qualification to the finale, scheduled for March 9 at the Jio World Convention Centre in Mumbai, India.

Ada Eme made the top 40 finalists cut after her excellent speech during the head-to-head challenge of the pageant competition where she was among the top five alongside Botswana, Zimbabwe, Lebanon and England.

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The head-to-head challenge is an important part of the competition given that it showcases a variety of global challenges and demonstrates Miss World’s dedication to promoting beauty with purpose.

This allows each competitor to clearly explain their projects, which range from environmental protection to healthcare initiatives, social justice efforts, and educational improvements.

Ada Eme’s speech for the project was tagged “Health For All” where she talked about a disease prevalent in the tropical areas of the world, ‘Schistosomiasis’.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), Schistosomiasis is an acute and chronic parasitic disease caused by blood flukes (trematode worms) of the genus Schistosoma.

People become infected when larval forms of the parasite – released by freshwater snails – penetrate the skin during contact with infested water.

The speech not only earned her a spot as a finalist but she also got awarded with a cash prize of 5,000 dollars by the Chairman and CEO of the Miss World Organisation (MWO), Julia Morley.

Speaking about her achievement with Arise TV news in a recent interview, Ada Eme noted that she was moved to do the project after she realised that the children who benefited from her scholarship programme were out of school again as a result of the disease.

“It is an endemic disease we experience, including my brother. Upon giving scholarships to children, I realised they were out of school again as a result of this disease. At that point, I knew I had to take action and it was important to speak for health care”, she said.

On emerging winner of the competition, Ada Eme expressed excitement about representing Nigeria, promising to put in her best. She added that she was hopeful since Nigeria had not won the title in 23 years after Agbani Darego.

In the history of the Miss World pageant competition, Nigeria has only emerged winner once. During the 51st edition of the competition in 2001, Agbani Darego emerged as the first Nigerian and African to clinch the title.

However, in 2019, Nigeria’s representative, Nyekachi Douglas came top in most of the activities including the head-to-head challenge, and top model competition, among others, making it to the top five and was named Miss World Africa.