Myo Ko Ko San

Myo Ko Ko San
မျိုးကိုကိုစန်း
Myo Ko Ko San at L'Oréal Event Myanmar
Born
Myo Ko Ko San

(1994-09-01) September 1, 1994 (age 30)
Mandalay, Myanmar
EducationTechnological University, Mandalay
Occupation(s)Model, LGBT advocate, Beauty queen
Height1.73 m (5 ft 8 in)
Beauty pageant titleholder
TitleMiss Rainbow Ribbon 2013
Miss International Queen Myanmar 2014
Years active2013–present
Hair colorDark Brown
Eye colourBlack
Major
competition(s)		Miss Rainbow Ribbon 2013 (Winner)
Miss International Queen 2014
(Unplaced)
Miss Universe Myanmar 2022
(Top 10)

Myo Ko Ko San (Burmese: မျိုးကိုကိုစန်း; born 1 September 1994) is a Burmese transgender model, and beauty pageant titleholder who was elected Miss International Queen Myanmar 2014 and represented Myanmar at the Miss International Queen 2014.[1][2]

Early life and education

Myo Ko Ko San was born on 1 September 1994 in Mandalay, Myanmar, as a boy. She is the second child among three siblings, having a younger brother and an older brother. She experienced gender dysphoria beginning in early childhood, and began her gender transition at the age of 15 while attending school. She studied civil engineering at Technological University, Mandalay. She underwent sex reassignment surgery in Thailand in 2017, sponsored by Kamol Cosmetic & Plastic Surgery.[3]

Career

In 2013, she participated in Miss Rainbow Ribbon 2013, a pageant for transgender women held on October 23, 2013, at the Hotel Mandalay by Rainbow Ribbon Network Myanmar. Following her victory, she was chosen to represent Myanmar in Miss International Queen 2014, the world's largest beauty pageant for transgender women.[4]

She represented Myanmar at the Miss International Queen 2014 pageant, held on November 7, 2014, in Pattaya, Thailand, competing against participants from 20 other nations. She achieved the 1st runner-up position for Talent.

After participating in the Miss International Queen 2014 pageant, she gained recognition as Miss International Queen Myanmar and went on to pursue a career as a transgender model.[5]

She is set to appear in an untitled film portraying a transgender person who stands up for her rights, even to the point of death. However, in 2016, she declined the offer because the production intended to replace her male voice.[6][7]

On 19 June 2018, she received the ASEAN-LGBT Community Pride Awards 2018.[8][9][10]

Myo Ko Ko San competed in Miss Universe Myanmar 2022 and made history as the first transgender woman to participate in the Miss Universe Myanmar Pageant. She achieved a top 10 placement.

Lawsuit

Myo Ko Ko San was sued under section 66 (d) of the telecommunications law by actress Wutt Hmone Shwe Yi, who filed a lawsuit against Myo for defamation, accusing Myo of being the administrator of Cele Cele Small, a Facebook page which posted allegedly defamatory material towards the actress. Cele Cele Small was a Facebook page with over 1 million likes that reveals inside information on the private lives of Myanmar's celebrities and artists. Police took the model into custody at Yangon International Airport on her return from a visit to Bangkok, Thailand, and she was held at the Yankin Township Police Station on 17 January 2017.[11][12]

Aftermath

In Yankin Township Court, Myo Ko Ko San denied involvement with the Facebook gossip page and questioned why the police had the right to arrest her without strong evidence. After four days in jail, Myo Ko Ko San was released and the defamation case against her was declared spurious as investigating officers found insufficient evidence to support the lawsuit.[13][14][15]

After being released, she conducted a press conference, emphasizing the necessity for Wutt Hmone Shwe Yi to publicly apologize to her for the false accusations.

LGBT activism

Myo Ko Ko San is an icon within Myanmar's LGBT community and an advocate for LGBT rights in Myanmar. Engaging in numerous campaigns for LGBT rights activism, Myo aspires to contribute to educating people about LGBT issues and fostering a deeper understanding in society.[1]

References

  1. ^ a b Chit Su (29 September 2014). "Beauty pageant with a difference". The Myanmar Times. Archived from the original on 27 August 2018. Retrieved 27 August 2018.
  2. ^ Thiha Toe (19 January 2017). "Actress Sues Model over Facebook Posts under Article 66(d)". The Irrawaddy.
  3. ^ "ဂေးအလှမယ် မျိုးကိုကိုစန်း ဘန်ကောက်မှာ လိင်ပြောင်းလဲခွဲစိတ်နေ". The Irrawaddy.
  4. ^ Kyay Mone Win (28 November 2013). "ဟိုတယ်မန္တလေးတွင် ပြုလုပ်ခဲ့သည့် Miss Rainbow Ribbon ပြိုင်ပွဲ". The Myanmar Times. Archived from the original on 15 September 2018. Retrieved 15 September 2018.
  5. ^ Kyaw, Kyaw Phone (19 January 2017). "LGBT beauty queen behind bars after actress files defamation suit". Frontier Myanmar.
  6. ^ Nyein Ei Ei Thwe (18 December 2015). "Beauty queen to star in transgender film". The Myanmar Times.
  7. ^ "ဂေးအလှမယ် မျိုးကိုကိုစန်းရဲ့ ငယ်ဘဝ". The Irrawaddy.
  8. ^ "Myo Koko San win ASEAN - LGBT Community Pride Awards 2018 - MIRadio". MIRadio. 19 June 2018. Archived from the original on 27 August 2018. Retrieved 27 August 2018.
  9. ^ "Myo Ko Ko San Vs Vietnam ASEAN – LGBT - DVB". Democratic Voice of Burma. 12 June 2018. Archived from the original on 11 October 2022. Retrieved 27 August 2018.
  10. ^ "မြန်မာလိင်ပြောင်းအလှမယ် မျိုးကိုကိုစန်းအာဆီယံ ဂုဏ်ပြုဆုရ" (in Burmese). The Voice Weekly. 13 June 2018. Archived from the original on 14 June 2018. Retrieved 27 August 2018.
  11. ^ "Myanmar actress sues transgender beauty queen for defamation". Mizzima. 20 January 2017.
  12. ^ "Statement on " Myo Ko Ko San" the Transgender Beauty Queen Detained by the Police". Progressive Voice Myanmar. 22 January 2017.
  13. ^ Nyein Ei Ei Thwe (24 January 2017). "Transgender beauty queen released, vows to investigate accusation". The Myanmar Times. Archived from the original on 27 August 2018. Retrieved 27 August 2018.
  14. ^ Kyaw, Kyaw Phone (20 January 2017). "Myo Ko Ko San released after defamation charges scuttled". Frontier Myanmar.
  15. ^ "Transgender beauty queen jailed in Myanmar". The Times of India.