Shal­iza Has­sanali

Min­utes af­ter Gabrielle Wal­cott placed third in the Miss World pageant in Jo­han­nes­burg, South Africa yes­ter­day, Pe­ter Elias, T&T's na­tion­al di­rec­tor of the Miss Uni­verse/Miss World, called it quits.

"This is the end of the road for me," said Elias, say­ing 2008 was his last pageant.

"There was al­ways a nev­er-end­ing chal­lenge for sup­port. I wish my suc­ces­sor all the best," Elias con­tin­ued, re­fus­ing to dwell fur­ther on the top­ic.

An elat­ed-sound­ing Elias said he made the de­ci­sion to call it a day un­known to Wal­cott and her fash­ion de­sign­er Bob­by Ack­bar­ali, who were up to late yes­ter­day cel­e­brat­ing at the coro­na­tion ball in Jo­han­nes­burg.

Elias said he did not want to spoil their night of fun and would in­form them of his de­ci­sion when the time was right.

Elias said he want­ed to spend more time with his fam­i­ly and in fash­ion de­sign­ing.

He thanked his team for go­ing the dis­tance with him.

Bask­ing in the glo­ry of Wal­cott's suc­cess, Elias said he was con­fi­dent she would have made T&T proud.

"Once you place in the first five, that is an ac­com­plish­ment in it­self," Elias said, beam­ing with pride.

Miss Rus­sia wins

Out of a field of 110 del­e­gates, 21-year-old Russ­ian beau­ty Kse­nia Sukhi­no­va won the Miss World 2008 ti­tle, while Par­vathy Omanakul­lan, 21, was named first run­ner up. Wal­cott placed third.

Apart from mak­ing it to win­ners' row, Wal­cott, 24, was al­so among three fi­nal­ists in the Miss World Best Dress.

She al­so emerged vic­to­ri­ous for the Beau­ty with a Pur­pose ti­tle–a char­i­ta­ble and so­cial project. She is a pa­tron of the Just Be­cause Foun­da­tion, which gives hope and health al­ter­na­tives to chil­dren liv­ing with can­cer in T&T. She raised $100,000 in char­i­ty for the cre­ation of a new chil­dren's ward at the Er­ic Williams Med­ical Sci­ences Com­plex.

Wal­cott, who wore a shim­mer­ing cham­pagne-and-white gown de­signed and made by Ack­bar­ali, was se­lect­ed by the judges as one of five fi­nal­ists: Miss In­dia, T&T, An­go­la, Rus­sia and South Africa.

Host Tu­misho Masha asked Wal­cott how she would per­suade the judges to give her the ti­tle. Stand­ing with poise Wal­cott re­spond­ed:

"Nel­son Man­dela once said a good mind and a good heart is a for­mi­da­ble com­bi­na­tion. That is the com­bi­na­tion I wish to share with you as I be­come the next Miss World, hope­ful­ly."

Wal­cott al­so gave an­oth­er quote by a man whom she con­sid­ered im­por­tant in her life–her dad: "To whom much is giv­en much is ex­pect­ed and that is achiev­ing with Beau­ty with a Pur­pose."

In a tele­phone in­ter­view, an elat­ed Ack­bar­ali said he spoke to Wal­cott who was over­joyed and ec­sta­t­ic.