24-year-old Phumelela Mapukata has become a national hero after walking away with the prestigious title of ‘Mr Deaf World. The pageant took place in Mpumalanga last weekend. South Africa has enjoyed plenty of spotlight at international pageantries over the past decade. We’ve seen our ladies walk away with a ‘Miss World’ (Rolene Strauss) and ‘Miss Universe’ (Demi-Leigh Nel-Peters) title, while several others have come close.
The gents haven’t done too badly either; with a number of them contesting ‘Mr World’ and ‘Mr Gay World’ pageants in recent years. This weekend we added another name to our list of global winners when Phumelela Mapukata walked away with the ‘Mr Deaf World’ title.
The 2017 public choice winner didn’t even think he’d be competing this year, but when the 2018 ‘Mr Deaf SA’, Kurt Dicks, was forced to sit out the global competition, Phumelela stepped in and gave it his best shot. Who knew that he would end up bringing home the big prize! Speaking to The Juice, Phumelela expressed his gratitude at walking away with the ‘Mr Deaf World’ title before explaining how he wanted to set an example for deaf children across South Africa.
“I want to be a role model for the kids and be someone others can look up during my reign as ‘Mr Deaf World’. It doesn’t matter where you come from or what your circumstances are you can unexpectedly rise to the top like I did, if you work towards your goals. It wasn’t just the gents who impressed at last weekend’s Mr and Miss Deaf pageants; ‘Miss Deaf South Africa’, Lethiwe Ntaka, came close to making it a double-win for South Africa after she emerged as the first runner-up in the ladies’ competition.
With a new ‘Miss South Africa’ being crowned next month, as well as the recently crowned ‘Mr South Africa’ and ‘Mr International South Africa’, is it too soon to expect a clean sweep at this year’s global pageants?
You might also like…Interesting things to know about Giyani: Land of Blood Actress Mathabo Mothibe
Interesting things to know about Giyani: Land of Blood Actress Mathabo Mothibe (Khensani)! Mzansi has fallen in love with her character on SABC 2 drama series Giyani-Land of blood but what do we know about the actress behind the character?
Get to know rising star Mathabo Mothibe with these five fun facts about her. Mathabo Mothibe graduated with a BTech in drama in 2015 from Tshwane University of Technology. She is happily married…Read more here
Source: All4Women
