Miss World South Africa 2024 Zoalize Jansen van Rensburg on Monday extended condolences to the families of the Pahalgam attack victims, days before her departure to India to participate in the Miss World 2025 pageant at the end of next month.
Jansen van Rensburg, who will represent South Africa at the 72nd edition of the pageant in Hyderabad from May 7 to May 31, will fly to India on Wednesday.
“First and foremost, it cannot go unnoticed to pay my condolences to the attack (in India). To be honest, standing here today, it’s a remembrance that we are not yet where we want to be (in the world when it comes to peace)” the digital and marketing executive from Pretoria said.
She was speaking at the Gurudwara Sahib in Johannesburg, where the local Sikh community presented her with a special plaque on Monday on the occasion of Freedom Day in South Africa.
The public holiday commemorates the day that late South African President Nelson Mandela was installed as South Africa’s first democratically-elected president in 1994 after 27 years as a political prisoner of the minority white apartheid-era government.
Gurudwara Johannesburg chairperson Pam Sethi thanked Jansen van Rensburg for seeking blessings at the Sikh shrine.
This is the third time the Miss World pageant is being held in India, following Miss World 1996 and last year’s edition.
Jansen van Rensburg said she believes the competition was back to India for a reason.
“India is such a beautiful country with so much heritage and culture.
Miss World represents exactly that. It’s a legacy brand that represents culture and unity,” she said.
Jansen van Rensburg said she was looking forward to her maiden India visit, she added.
Later, the Miss World South Africa 2024 also joined the women of the gurudwara in the kitchen to prepare the langar (community meal) afterwards to have an authentic Punjabi experience.
She learnt how to roll out rotis and also helped serve up the meal to diners.
“I feel a sense of awakening in many ways. And the reason I use the word awakening is because I’m all about international and cultural understanding.
I make it a priority to respect and understand the people around me and to experience different cultures.
“It not only expands my knowledge on the world, but it also allows me to respect the people of the world because at the end of the day, we’re all drawn back to one thing and that is our humanity,” she said. (PTI)
