NILINAW ng Carousel Productions, na nag-oorganisa ng taunang Miss Philippines Earth at Miss Earth beauty pageants, na hindi nito kukunsintihin ang anumang “rude or immoral behaviour” s a s i n u m a n g delegado at kawani ng pageant.

I t o a y m a k a r a a n g nagpalabas ng official statement nitong Huwebes s i Lorraine Schuck, Executive Vice President ng Carousel Productions, kasunod ng mga ulat na tatlong kandidata sa katatapos na Miss Earth sa Pilipinas—ang mga pambato ng Canada, England, at Guam—ang umano’y nabiktima ng sexual harassment ng isa sa mga sponsors ng pageant. Hindi pinangalanan sa pahayag kung sino ang inirereklamong sponsor.

“The Miss Earth organization has always and continues to look after the safety, security and welfare of its candidates. It has not and will never condone nor tolerate any offensive or indecent acts or behaviour to be committed towards or against any of its delegates and staff,” saad sa pahayag ng mga organizers.

“Delegates of Miss Earth are divided into 3 groups with each group having 3 Team Managers and 3 Philippines National Police detail;

“At the very start of the pageant, the Team Managers brief all the delegates on several matters including, but not limited to, what their activities will be during their stay, the need to rest and sleep early, how to look after their personal stuff like wallets and telephones when they are out, to not believe or ignore people they meet who claim to be one of the pageant’s judges and, most important, to report immediately to their Team Manager or PNP detail if they have any problems whatsoever especially on their safety and security;

“In a function last October 14, Miss Canada and Miss England reported to their Team Managers that they felt like being sexually harassed by one of the function’s sponsor. The moment the office told me about the incident, I called the Team Managers immediately and ask them what happened. I assured Miss England and Miss Canada that the Miss Earth organization d o e s n o t condone nor tolerate any r u d e o r i m m o r a l b e h a v i o u r towards the de l e g a t e s b y sponsors or anybody for that matter. I IMMEDIATELY instructed our Project Director to ban the alleged perpetrator from all further functions and events;

“Subsequently, I requested ALL the delegates to submit a written statement to me to enable me to find out directly from them if they experienced a similar incident so we could take appropriate action. I also wanted to find out if any of the other delegates could corroborate the complaint of Miss Canada and Miss England so we could use the statements to help the two in case they decided to file a case against the alleged harasser. We were ready to support the two in any action they may have wished to take against the individual who offended them. Unfortunately, instead of working together with us on this matter they opted to go to social media and discredit and disparage the organization;

“The Miss Earth organization DOES NOT CONFISCATE passports of delegates. In the 18 years we’ve been doing this pageant, there had been several instances of candidates misplacing or losing their passports. We hold the delegates passports for safekeeping and to facilitate their check-in for their domestic flights and hotel accommodations. The delegates are free to keep their passports if they want to;

“Incidentally, Miss Liberia who was supposed to fly back to her country last November 5 was not allowed to fly because she had misplaced her passport. She had to stay overnight in the airport because she was not allowed to re-enter the country and go back to the hotel without a passport.”

-ROBERT R. REQUINTINA