Ukrainian model Veronika Didusenko, who won the Miss Ukraine beauty pageant on Sept. 20, could hold the title for the shortest time in the history of the contest.
Didusenko, 23, was stripped of her crown four days after the show, soon after the Miss Ukraine committee found out she broke the contest rules: The model has a child and had been married.
Didusenko has refused to comment on the issue so far, saying only that she would make an announcement at a press conference on Sept. 27.
The Miss Ukraine contest has been held in Ukraine since 1991. After buying three licenses in 2014, the contest has held shows annually, picking women to represent Ukraine at three international beauty pageants – Miss World, Miss Earth and Miss International.
Didusenko won the Miss Ukraine title on Sept. 20 and was supposed to represent Ukraine at the Miss World competition, which will be held on Dec. 9 in Sanya, China.
The Miss Ukraine jury will now pick a new winner on Sept. 27, with the decision being announced during a TV screening of the contest on TV channel 1+1 on Sept. 30 at 11:30 p.m. (GMT+3).
The CEO of Miss Ukraine, Viktoria Kiose, says that the contest had found out that Didusenko had broken the rules of the competition after receiving calls from journalists and other people who claimed that Didusenko had a child.
They later received multiple messages from various people sending photographs of a pregnant Didusenko and images of her with a child, Kiose said.
There are no photographs of Didusenko and her child on her social media pages.
However, contest lawyers soon announced that they had obtained legal confirmation that Didusenko is divorced and that she has a four-year-old son.
The model refused to either confirm or deny the reports to the Kyiv Post, saying she would provide details at a press conference on Sept. 27.
However, the founder of the CFC Consulting company, Gennadiy Kurochka, with whom Didusenko is in a relationship according to her Facebook page, confirmed she is a divorced mother.
“Veronika (Didusenko) has a wonderful four-year-old boy from her first marriage,” Kurochka wrote in a comment to the Facebook post he wrote about Didusenko.
According to the rules of the international contests, which are also applied to Miss Ukraine, as it acts under their licenses, participants have to be women under 24 who have never been married and who don’t have children.
Kiose says that all the participants, including Didusenko, were aware of the rules listed in the agreement they signed.
As it turned out that Didusenko didn’t meet the requirements, the contest stripped her of the crown on Sept. 24, she said.
According to the agreement participants sign, those who break the rules are obliged to pay the expenses that Miss Ukraine spent on their participation – lessons, rehearsals and outfits.
However, Kiose says that this is a large amount of money and Miss Ukraine have decided to “take pity” on Didusenko.
“We decided to act humanely, but this will be a good lesson for other girls,” Kiose told the Kyiv Post.
Kiose said that the contests require participants to not have children because those who win the title work under contract for a year, have many obligations, and are not able to spend time with their kids.
She says that the winners are supposed to travel abroad, and take part in runway fashion shows and photo shoots.
Didusenko, however, seems to disagree with Kiose. The CEO said that the model told her she wanted to change the rules at the international level.
And Didusenko’s partner Kurochka called the contest rules discriminatory.
“We will fight worthily, not for the title, but for a change in these atavisms,” Kurochka said in a comment on his Facebook page.
