'We will not be bullied'

The mother of Myanmar’s underage beauty queen, San San Htwe, is planning a counter attack against the organisers of South Korea’s Miss Asia Pacific World pageant if it follows through on a plan to file criminal charges against her.

“We are planning to counter them in accordance with the law. My daughter is still too young,” she said, after a member of the organisation’s committee, Andre Jung, said he was preparing to file criminal charges against May Myat Noe’s mother as well as sue her for punitive damages.

San San Htwe said that her daughter was trying to focus on her studies and forget her ordeal in South Korea, but she would not be bullied. 

“We have already informed them that we will return the crown to the officials from the Korean organisation. If they are going to sue us, we will have to sue them back,” San San Htwe added.

A local lawyer noted that the beauty queen and her mother should be safe from the reach of Korean courts because they do not extend to Myanmar. 

He also noted that when Master Sports shoe factory – owned by Korean national Bang In-ho –shut its doors without paying salary and compensation to its Myanmar workers, Korean authorities failed to step in to lend the impoverished workers a hand. Bang returned to Korea scot-free after shutting the factory in July. 

“Now, a committee member of Miss Asia Pacific World is preparing to file criminal charges against May Myat Noe’s mother. May Myat Noe and her mother reside in Myanmar. Even if they file a lawsuit, they can only do so in accordance with their law. They can’t come and arrest them because this is a personal issue. They are not criminal fugitives who committed an international crime and so [the Korean authorities] can’t come and arrest them. Just as we can’t take any effective actions against Bang In-ho after he ran back to his home country, the Korean [authorities] can’t do anything to May Myat Noe and her mother,” the lawyer said.

In a press statement released recently, Jung, chief commissioner of the organising committee, noted that May Myat Noe told a press conference attended by about 100 reporters from around the world that pageant organisers pressured her to have “head-to-toe” plastic surgery and suggested as well that she should “escort Korean tycoons” who might be able to help boost her singing career.

 

Damaged reputation

This claim has damaged the reputation of the committee, the sponsors and the country, Jung said. The organisation’s chairman said he had consulted with Kim Joon-gyu, a former attorney-general of Korea who said he would introduce Jung to an international lawyer in Myanmar. The committee members all agreed that they would press criminal charges to have Miss Myanmar May Myat Noe and her mother arrested and put into prison. After that they would further investigate the case.

The committee members stated that “May Myat Noe has ruined the reputation and brand of the Miss Asia Pacific World Organisation so greatly that the return of the crown or even her death would not solve this problem”.

They also claimed that the former beauty queen has also soured relationships between Myanmar and South Korea and caused a strain on business ties between the two countries. The girl, who was 15 at the time she was crowned, has also been blamed for the decline in the cultural exchanges between the two countries. 

Furthermore, they said that May Myat Noe’s claim that she did not have any cosmetic surgery contradicts previous claims that she was forced into getting it. In an interview on MBC she stated that “when my mother and I signed the consent form operation agreement, I thought it was for a medical check. I didn’t know the meaning of the form.” 

“Through this false interview, she has deceived the entire world press making South Korea the laughing stock of the world,” the organisation said in its statement.

In late August, May Myat Noe was stripped of the title she won in May. 

The organisation attributed the decision to bad behaviour. She returned home with the gem-studded tiara and vowed to return it only when the organisation apologised. The tussle over the tiara subsequently grabbed international headlines.

“Due to one foreign woman’s accusations of being forced to perform sexual favours, the entire entertainment industry in South Korea has been shaken,” a media critic at MBC said. 

“The most important reason for pressing criminal charges is to prevent the Korean entertainment industry from collapsing due to her false accusations. By thoroughly punishing her, this will prevent her from ever making any more false accusations,” the Miss Asia Pacific World Organisation said.

In the statement, it also claimed that another controversy at the pageant, involving Miss Wales in the 2011, was false. 

It said that it would prevent the media “from ruining our beauty pageant with these false stories”.