(Seychelles News Agency) - The Creative Industries and National Events Agency, CINEA, has launched the tender for the organisation of this year’s Miss Seychelles Beauty Pageant.

CINEA's chief executive Gaelen Bresson told SNA that this year the pageant is expected to be held in July.

“We will be meeting with prospective bidders by Wednesday next week to discuss the organisation of this year’s pageant. The successful bidder will manage the event while CINEA will oversee it,” said Bresson.

The chief executive added that "they will be putting forward their ideas and concepts, and from there we will have the selection process.”

CINEA has also announced that this year the event will be organised with a partner who will also host the pageant. Details of the partnership and venue will be announced once a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the two parties is signed.

The beauty pageant under the title Miss Seychelles Another World was hosted by the Seychelles Tourism Board (STB) since 2012. It was held every year in May with ample time for the crowned beauty to be groomed for the Miss World Beauty Pageant which takes place in December.

Bresson admitted that they are currently having some problems with the name and the license of the pageant which is copyrighted by the Seychelles Tourism Board.

He said that these are expected to be resolved through discussions, “either STB gives us the name for future use, or we have to come up with a new name for next year’s edition.”

CINEA has also expressed its disappointment with some companies which had previously signed agreements with STB to support Miss Seychelles and are now no longer willing to do so.

“Some companies are not abiding by their commitments set in the MOU, under the guise that they do not know whether CINEA will manage or organise the event per STB’s capacity, and this is very sad,” Bresson said.

The chief executive said that the pageant will remain more or less the same where contestants will have to work on a project. The only difference is that CINEA will be choosing specific areas for project proposals to ensure that whatever the participants work on is realistic and achievable during their tenure as Miss Seychelles.

Miss Seychelles beauty pageant, which was meant to be an annual event, had not been organised every year since it started in 1969, until five years ago when the STB took it onboard as part of their annual calendar of activities.

The reigning beauty queen of Seychelles, an archipelago in the western Indian Ocean, is Christine Barbier, who was crowned Miss Seychelles Another World 2016.