A lot is said about beauty pageants, but one thing for sure is that participating in one can be a good opportunity for girls to not just express their talents and abilities, but also to use the platform they get to make a difference in their communities.

Take an example of Alliance Irasubiza, who emerged Miss Popularity in the Miss Rwanda 2020 pageant. For her, winning the Miss Popularity vote was not just about wearing the stash and smiling for cameras.

From the word go, she knew that it was an opportunity she could not take for granted when she saw how people believed in her and went all out to vote for her.

Irasubiza says backward mindsets that hold back girls should be dropped. 

Though she did not wear the Miss Rwanda crown, winning Miss Popularity in what was one of the most competitive pageants in recent years was no easy feat.

"It was such a great thing to see Rwandans supporting and voting for me, putting me on top of that list, but also it's a responsibility that I was given,” Irasubiza says, adding that even the way she carries herself had to change because of the trust people had put in her.

In a way, it made her understand that she had a role to play in society not just in terms of making a difference but also being accountable to the public that believed in her dreams and entrusted her with their votes.

"You know that whatever I'm doing or everything I am involved in has to be good for the people who have put their trust in me,” Irasubiza says.

Chasing dreams

For the 23-year-old, there's no such thing as the right time for you to start doing something. If you believe in something, if there's something you love to do, go ahead and do it because there are hundreds of other people who are thinking about the same thing.

"Someday you will feel like it's too late, so you can't wait to be ready because time is running. If you are confident, whoever you talk to, they are going to believe in you. Give yourself a chance, be confident and start now,” Irasubiza advises girls, adding that confidence is the key.

Miss Popularity 2020 on using her platform to make a difference. 

She advises those who still harbour backward and conservative gender roles that hold back women and girls to drop that mind-set because it is meaningless and hampers progress.

"The mind-set and mentality that has been put out that women are not able to achieve as much as men can is really sad,” she notes.

Irasubiza believes that in this day and age, the debate should no longer be about whether women are capable or not. It has been proven that when girls set out to achieve their goals, they can do it.

Participating in Miss Rwanda

The model, entrepreneur, fashion lover and change maker believes there is no limit as to what girls can achieve and she attributes her change of mind-set to taking part in Miss Rwanda.

"The competition itself opened up my mind. I was able to grow in a sense of understanding. It was my very first experience. It's really good to take on challenges and experience new things,” Irasubiza says.

Though the competition was challenging, going through it gave her the power she didn’t know she had in her- taking on challenges head on and believing in herself that she can achieve something on her own.

"It gave me a sense of growth, of knowing that I have the power to do anything that I put my mind to. But it also opened many doors for me because you're exposed to the population, to the people,”

"People get to know you, get to like you and get to listen to you. It was an opportunity for me to put my ideas into action,” she says of the competition.

Surprisingly, she had never thought she would participate in Miss Rwanda, having grown up behaving like a boy, dressing like a boy and fighting boys. Her cousins and friends kept pushing her to participate in Miss Rwanda and eventually she buckled.

In her, she knew she had qualities of leadership and also a business mind but she had never thought a beauty pageant would be the platform to bring out those particular qualities.

However, at the back of her mind, the 21-year-old at the time knew the exposure a platform like Miss Rwanda would give her and that is how she decided to audition from the City of Kigali. As they say, the rest is history.

Today, Irasubiza is doing a number of things to empower vulnerable communities and is pursuing her education, currently in the final year at university and can’t wait to graduate soon.

She is working on a project that empowers women in rural areas to fight malnutrition, through a ‘day care’ initiative where women volunteer to stay and take care of children of their colleagues whenever they are out in the field.

The women are able to monitor and feed the children at the same time while others are out working.

The idea came after it was observed that women leave behind their children when they go to work, leaving no one to take care of them. As a result, children would get stunted.

The initiative’s pilot phase was rolled out one year ago in Gakenke sector, Gicumbi district, in Northern Province. She also looks at supporting women in income generating activities.

Irasubiza says that much as there is no study yet to show the outcome in numbers, the impact has already been felt in the community. She hopes to roll it out countrywide.