The Mutya ng Pilipinas stage at the FilOil EcoOil Centre in San Juan City is ready for the national pageant’s 52nd staging./ARMIN P. ADINA
MANILA, Philippines—Finally, the time has come for the Mutya ng Pilipinas pageant to stage a coronation program three years after it last mounted a competition. The national contest took a break in 2020 and 2021 because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Tonight, 40 ladies from around the country and from different overseas Filipino communities will compete at the FilOil EcoOil Center in San Juan City at 7 p.m.
Four main titles are at stake—Mutya ng Pilipinas 2022, Mutya ng Pilipinas-Tourism International, Mutya ng Pilipinas-World Top Model, and Mutya ng Pilipinas-Overseas Communities.
The runners-up will also receive special titles—Mutya ng Pilipinas-Luzon, Mutya ng Pilipinas-Visayas, and Mutya ng Pilipinas-Mindanao.
Reigning queen Klyza Castro is set to host the ceremonies, together with broadcaster Gretchen Fullido and actor Marco Gumabao. P-pop group Alamat, girl group G22, and Jon Guelas will provide musical performances.
Established in 1968, the Mutya ng Pilipinas pageant is one of the most enduring national beauty contests in the Philippines. It has produced multiple international winners from some of the longest-running global competitions in the world.
Forty delegates are competing in the 52nd Mutya ng Pilipinas pageant./ARMIN P. ADINA
Five Mutya titleholders have captured the Miss Asia Pacific International crown in the global pageant’s various iterations—Carines Zaragoza in 1982, Bong Dimayacyac in 1983, Lorna Legaspi in 1989, Michelle Aldana in 1993, and Sharifa Areef Mohammad Omar Akeel in 2018.
Five other Mutya queens won in the Malaysia-based Miss Tourism International pageant—Peachy Manzano in 2000, the late Rizzini Alexis Gomez in 2012, Angeli Dione Gomez in 2013, Jannie Loudette Alipo-on in 2017, and Cyrille Payumo in 2019.
Mutya queens Gemith Gemparo and Leren Mae Bautista were also proclaimed 1993 Miss Model of the World and 2015 Miss Tourism Queen of the Year International, respectively.
The 2022 Mutya ng Pilipinas pageant will be available real-time on the streaming platform Kumu via the FYE channel at 7 p.m. There will be a delayed telecast on A2Z channel and the Kapamilya Channel, and a delayed streaming on the Kapamilya Online Live YouTube Channel and iWantTFC, at 10:30 p.m.