All of us are holding our breath for our Miss Universe contestant Deborah Henry to hopefully bring home the coveted title. But we have to wait a little bit longer for that as the actual event will only take place on the 13th of this month.

In the anticipation of that, we actually have a similar event which will be taking place around the same time as Miss Universe in Sao Paolo. It’s Manhunt 2011. The competition will be held starting from 28th September until 12th October 2011 in Seoul. Are we ready for it and do we have a deserving winner to represent our country this time around? Yes we do.

Well let’s talk about the history of the competition as some of us might not be too familiar with the idea of male beauty pageant. Do we call it male beauty pageant in the first place?

The Mannhunt Contest started off in 1987, when Alex Liu, pageant director of Metromedia Singapore, decided to stage the first male model contest in Singapore. There were numerous pageants for women and nothing for the men. So Liu carefully planned and engineered his first Manhunt contest in Singapore and it became an overnight success.

Manhunt became International in 1993. It was first held in Australia’s Gold Coast in 1993, when Germany’s Thomas Sasse took the first Manhunt International title from 25 contestants. In 1994, the pageant remained in Australia’s Gold Coast when Nikos Papadakis of Greece won. The Manhunt International Event is a joint partnership with our Australian partner, Procon Leisure International Pty Ltd, headed by Mr. Rosko Dickinson.

The pageant saw one of its most successful year in November 1995 when 35 of the world’s most hunted males came to Sentosa Island, Singapore to compete for the prestigious title. The cash award and prizes for 1995′s winner alone exceeded $100,000.00. South Africa’s Albe Geldenhuys won that year. And India’s Dino Morea came a close first runner up. The Manhunt International 1995 world final was televised on television in Singapore and 38 countries with an estimated 420 million viewers worldwide. Newspapers and magazines unanimously agreed that the time for a male contest had come. Their headlines screamed THE MANHUNT IS ON!

This year’s competition will see contestants from countries like France, England, Indonesia, Germany and of course Malaysia going after the title. The online voting is currently on and people get to choose their favourite contestant through the official website www.manhunt.sg.

As for our country’s representative, his name is Hazwan Hilmi@Juan. The 188cm tall model beat nine other contestants at the final round held at Market Place last month. Emm-a-man was there at the competition to witness the selection process first hand. The contestants paraded their gym-hard bodies in creations by local designers like Bon Zainal and Azmeer Versatile. The judging panels consisted of local fashion insiders and celeb including last year’s winner Tim Simp.

Let’s hope Juan will take home with him the title and prove to the world that when it comes to hot men, we do have a little something going on in this little sunny side of the world.

Additional info: Manhunt official website