Valeska Alexandra Saab Gómez (born 7 May 1984) is an
Ecuadorian
Ecuadorians ( es, ecuatorianos) are people identified with the South American country of Ecuador. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Ecuadorians, several (or all) of these connections exist and are colle ...
charity worker, model, and beauty pageant titleholder.
The 2005 ''Miss Maja Mundial'' title holder and, with
Kayi Cheung
Kayi Cheung (; Pinyin: Zhāng Jiā'ér; Yale: Jeung1 Ga1 Yi4, born on 18 November 1983) is a Hong Kong-Canadian model and beauty pageant titleholder who was crowned Miss Hong Kong 2007 and 1st Runner-up of the Miss Chinese International 2008. She ...
from
Hong Kong
Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China ( abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delt ...
, the 2007
Beauty with a Purpose
Julia Evelyn Morley (née Pritchard; born 25 October 1939) is a British businesswoman, charity worker, and former model. She is the chairman and CEO of the Miss World Organization, which organizes the Miss World and Mister World. She is the w ...
Challenge winner during the
Miss World 2007
Miss World 2007, the 57th edition of the Miss World pageant, was held on 1 December 2007 at the Crown of Beauty Theatre in Sanya, China. It was hosted by Fernando Allende and Angela Chow. Zhang Zilin of China won the crown and succeeded ...
contest
Contest may refer to:
* Competition
* Will contest
* Contesting, amateur radio contesting (radiosport)
Film and television
* ''Contest'' (2013 film), an American film
* Contest (1932 film), a German sports film
* " The Contest", a 1992 season ...
. In
Ecuador
Ecuador ( ; ; Quechua: ''Ikwayur''; Shuar: ''Ecuador'' or ''Ekuatur''), officially the Republic of Ecuador ( es, República del Ecuador, which literally translates as "Republic of the Equator"; Quechua: ''Ikwadur Ripuwlika''; Shuar: ''Eku ...
, she is noted for her work with children suffering from
Ichthyosis
Ichthyosis is a family of genetic skin disorders characterized by dry, thickened, scaly skin. The more than 20 types of ichthyosis range in severity of symptoms, outward appearance, underlying genetic cause and mode of inheritance (e.g., dominant ...
.
Early life
Saab was born in
Guayaquil
, motto = Por Guayaquil Independiente en, For Independent Guayaquil
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, pushpin_map = Ecuador#South America
, pushpin_re ...
, Ecuador, to Jesús Saab and María del Rocío ''Chio'' Gómez Buenaventura on Monday, May 7, 1984. Just the day before her birth (Sunday, May 6),
León Febres Cordero
León Esteban Febres-Cordero Ribadeneyra (9 March 1931 – 15 December 2008), known in the Ecuadorian media as LFC or more simply by his composed surname (Febres-Cordero), was the 35th President of Ecuador, serving a four-year term from 10 Augu ...
had become
President of Ecuador
The president of Ecuador ( es, Presidente del Ecuador), officially called the Constitutional President of the Republic of Ecuador ( es, Presidente Constitucional de la República del Ecuador), serves as both the head of state and head of govern ...
defeating
Rodrigo Borja
Rodrigo Borja Cevallos (born 19 June 1935) is an Ecuadorian politician who was List of heads of state of Ecuador, President of Ecuador from 10 August 1988 to 10 August 1992. He is also a descendant of the House of Borgia.
Life
Borja was born ...
in the second round of the
1984 Ecuadorian Presidential Election. She has two older brothers, Cristian and Patrick, and a younger one, Javier. In
Guayaquil
, motto = Por Guayaquil Independiente en, For Independent Guayaquil
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, pushpin_map = Ecuador#South America
, pushpin_re ...
, Saab attended the ''Unidad Educativa Bilingüe Nuevo Mundo'' High School, Brookdale Community College and Blue Hill College where she studied
International Business. She is fluent in Spanish and English.
Pageantry
Her
beauty queen
A beauty pageant is a competition that has traditionally focused on judging and ranking the physical attributes of the contestants. Pageants have now evolved to include inner beauty, with criteria covering judging of personality, intelligence, ...
career began in 2000 in
Salinas, a coastal city in the
Santa Elena Province, Ecuador
The Province of Santa Elena () is a province of Ecuador in the coastal region. Created in 2007 from territory that belonged to the Guayas Province, it is one of the two newest provinces of Ecuador, along with Santo Domingo de Los Tsáchilas. It ...
, near
Guayaquil
, motto = Por Guayaquil Independiente en, For Independent Guayaquil
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, pushpin_map = Ecuador#South America
, pushpin_re ...
, when she was crowned ''Reina del
Salinas''
Yacht Club
A yacht club is a sports club specifically related to yachting.
Description
Yacht clubs are mostly located by the sea, although there some that have been established at a lake or riverside locations. Yacht or sailing clubs have either a mari ...
. In 2004, in the Reina de Guayaquil
pageant
Pageant may refer to:
* Procession or ceremony in elaborate costume
* Beauty pageant, or beauty contest
* Latter Day Saint plays and pageants, run by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints or by members local to the area of the pageant
* ...
, Saab placed as first runner-up and so won the title of ''Virreina de Guayaquil''. After that, she was chosen ''
Reina Hispanoamericana
Reina Hispanoamericana (''Hispanic American Queen'') is an annual beauty pageant celebrating Hispanic heritage, language and culture, started in 1991 as Reina Sudamericana (''South American Queen''), is based in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia. ...
Ecuador 2004'' and so competed in the
Reina Hispanoamericana
Reina Hispanoamericana (''Hispanic American Queen'') is an annual beauty pageant celebrating Hispanic heritage, language and culture, started in 1991 as Reina Sudamericana (''South American Queen''), is based in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia. ...
contest
Contest may refer to:
* Competition
* Will contest
* Contesting, amateur radio contesting (radiosport)
Film and television
* ''Contest'' (2013 film), an American film
* Contest (1932 film), a German sports film
* " The Contest", a 1992 season ...
held in
Cochabamba
Cochabamba ( ay, Quchapampa; qu, Quchapampa) is a city and municipality in central Bolivia in a valley in the Andes mountain range. It is the capital of the Cochabamba Department and the fourth largest city in Bolivia, with a population of 63 ...
,
Bolivia
, image_flag = Bandera de Bolivia (Estado).svg
, flag_alt = Horizontal tricolor (red, yellow, and green from top to bottom) with the coat of arms of Bolivia in the center
, flag_alt2 = 7 × 7 square p ...
, but without success. However, a few months after, in
Sincelejo
Sincelejo () is the capital and largest city of the Colombian department of Sucre. It is also the main city in the denominated '' Región Sabanas'' (Savannas Region), a subdivision of the Caribbean Region of Colombia, and the 23rd largest ci ...
,
Colombia
Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...
, Saab won the ''Miss Maja Mundial 2005'', her major international title. She placed again as first runner-up in the
Miss Ecuador 2007 pageant
Pageant may refer to:
* Procession or ceremony in elaborate costume
* Beauty pageant, or beauty contest
* Latter Day Saint plays and pageants, run by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints or by members local to the area of the pageant
* ...
and so won the
Miss World Ecuador 2007 title.
Saab then competed in the
Miss World 2007
Miss World 2007, the 57th edition of the Miss World pageant, was held on 1 December 2007 at the Crown of Beauty Theatre in Sanya, China. It was hosted by Fernando Allende and Angela Chow. Zhang Zilin of China won the crown and succeeded ...
held in
Sanya
Sanya (; also spelled Samah) is the southernmost city on Hainan Island, and one of the four prefecture-level cities of Hainan Province in South China.
According to the 2020 census, the total population of Sanya was 1,031,396 inhabitants, li ...
,
People's Republic of China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
where she made history by becoming the first
Miss Ecuador to win the
Beauty With A Purpose
Julia Evelyn Morley (née Pritchard; born 25 October 1939) is a British businesswoman, charity worker, and former model. She is the chairman and CEO of the Miss World Organization, which organizes the Miss World and Mister World. She is the w ...
award, based on her
charity work helping children with a terrible genetic skin condition called
ichthyosis
Ichthyosis is a family of genetic skin disorders characterized by dry, thickened, scaly skin. The more than 20 types of ichthyosis range in severity of symptoms, outward appearance, underlying genetic cause and mode of inheritance (e.g., dominant ...
. Saab tied with
Miss Hong Kong
The Miss Hong Kong Pageant (), or Miss HK () for short, is an annual beauty pageant organised by local Hong Kong television station, TVB. The pageant was established in 1946, and acquired by TVB in 1973.
The current Miss Hong Kong is Denice La ...
,
Kayi Cheung
Kayi Cheung (; Pinyin: Zhāng Jiā'ér; Yale: Jeung1 Ga1 Yi4, born on 18 November 1983) is a Hong Kong-Canadian model and beauty pageant titleholder who was crowned Miss Hong Kong 2007 and 1st Runner-up of the Miss Chinese International 2008. She ...
, for the award so both advanced to the semifinals automatically. She is the first Miss Ecuador to make the
Miss World semifinals since Alicia Gisela Cucalón Macas did in 1986. Saab retired from
beauty contests in 2007 and began a career as a
model
A model is an informative representation of an object, person or system. The term originally denoted the plans of a building in late 16th-century English, and derived via French and Italian ultimately from Latin ''modulus'', a measure.
Models c ...
.
Political career
In 2009, Saab was elected to the
Andean Parliament
The Andean Parliament is the governing and deliberative body of the Andean Community. It was created on October 25, 1979, in La Paz (Bolivia), through the Constitutive Treaty signed by the chancellors of Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Vene ...
for the Madera de Guerrero/
PSC, the former
President
President most commonly refers to:
*President (corporate title)
*President (education), a leader of a college or university
*President (government title)
President may also refer to:
Automobiles
* Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ful ...
León Febres Cordero
León Esteban Febres-Cordero Ribadeneyra (9 March 1931 – 15 December 2008), known in the Ecuadorian media as LFC or more simply by his composed surname (Febres-Cordero), was the 35th President of Ecuador, serving a four-year term from 10 Augu ...
's
Political Party
A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific political ideology ...
. In May 2012, as President of Fifth Commission "Of Social Affairs and Human Development", she coordinated the III Social Andean Summit. She finished her period in 2013.
Charity Work
After winning the title of
Miss World Ecuador 2007, Saab began helping children affected by a rare disease called
ichtyosis; and her work continues from then on. In addition, she is a member of the
board of management
A board of directors (commonly referred simply as the board) is an executive committee that jointly supervises the activities of an organization, which can be either a for-profit or a nonprofit organization such as a business, nonprofit organiz ...
of a
charitable foundation
A foundation (also a charitable foundation) is a category of nonprofit organization or charitable trust that typically provides funding and support for other charitable organizations through grants, but may also engage directly in charitable act ...
called Kinderzentrum, an
institution dedicated to helping special children with syndrome of down,
autism
The autism spectrum, often referred to as just autism or in the context of a professional diagnosis autism spectrum disorder (ASD) or autism spectrum condition (ASC), is a neurodevelopmental condition (or conditions) characterized by difficulti ...
, cerebral paralysis among other
emotional problems.
Personal life
Saab is of
Lebanese background. She is niece of the 1971
Miss World Ecuador María Cecila Gómez Buenaventura and her husband, the
economist
An economist is a professional and practitioner in the social sciences, social science discipline of economics.
The individual may also study, develop, and apply theories and concepts from economics and write about economic policy. Within this ...
,
politician
A politician is a person active in party politics, or a person holding or seeking an elected office in government. Politicians propose, support, reject and create laws that govern the land and by an extension of its people. Broadly speaking, a ...
and former
Ecuadorian
Ecuadorians ( es, ecuatorianos) are people identified with the South American country of Ecuador. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Ecuadorians, several (or all) of these connections exist and are colle ...
basketball
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...
player Nicolás Lapentti Carrión, who was a close collaborator of the ex-
President
President most commonly refers to:
*President (corporate title)
*President (education), a leader of a college or university
*President (government title)
President may also refer to:
Automobiles
* Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ful ...
Febres Cordero,
National Assembly
In politics, a national assembly is either a unicameral legislature, the lower house of a bicameral legislature, or both houses of a bicameral legislature together. In the English language it generally means "an assembly composed of the rep ...
Member from 2009 to 2013 and, for almost 17 years in a row,
Prefect
Prefect (from the Latin ''praefectus'', substantive adjectival form of ''praeficere'': "put in front", meaning in charge) is a magisterial title of varying definition, but essentially refers to the leader of an administrative area.
A prefect's ...
of the
Province of Guayas. Saab is cousin of the former professional
tennis
Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball ...
players
Nicolás and
Giovanni Lapentti
Giovanni Lapentti Gómez (; born 25 January 1983) is retired Ecuadorian tennis player. His brother is Nicolás Lapentti, another professional tennis player, while a third brother, Leonardo, has also been active at the lower levels of professiona ...
, and
1990 French Open winner
Andrés Gómez
Andrés Gómez Santos (; born 27 February 1960) is an Ecuadorian former professional tennis player. He won the men's singles title at the French Open in 1990.
His son, Emilio Gómez, is a professional tennis player. His nephew Nicolás Lapent ...
's niece. On January 14, 2011, in
Samborondón
Samborondón is a canton in Ecuador’s Guayas province. It has 105 localities and two urban parishes (''La Puntilla'') and Samborondón Town (Cabecera cantonal) and one rural parish (''Tarifa''). La Puntilla's parish is one of the most exclusiv ...
, near
Guayaquil
, motto = Por Guayaquil Independiente en, For Independent Guayaquil
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, pushpin_map = Ecuador#South America
, pushpin_re ...
, she married to young
Guayaquilean entrepreneur
Entrepreneurship is the creation or extraction of economic value. With this definition, entrepreneurship is viewed as change, generally entailing risk beyond what is normally encountered in starting a business, which may include other values th ...
Nicolás Florido. Saab gave birth to her first daughter Alana (named after
American
American(s) may refer to:
* American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America"
** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America
** American ancestry, pe ...
professional
surfer Alana Rene Blanchard) on October 11, 2012 and to her second one, Alissa, in 2014.
References
External links
{{DEFAULTSORT:Saab, Valeska
Miss World 2007 delegates
1984 births
Living people
Ecuadorian people of Lebanese descent
Ecuadorian people of Spanish descent
People from Guayaquil
Ecuadorian beauty pageant winners