Anneline Kriel is a South African actress, an international model and beauty queen. She won Miss South Africa and Miss World in 1974 after the UK's Helen Morgan resigned only four days after her victory. Anneline is the second woman to hold the title of Miss World in South Africa after Penelope Coelen in 1958. From filmography to modelling, the former Miss World has sustainably maintained her fame with an overwhelming influence. Her story has eventually become an incredible tale of both struggles and accomplishments.
Career
Kriel was only nineteen years old when she became Miss World in 1974. This marked a tumultuous period in South African history, as the international boycott of South Africa due to the apartheid system continued to take place. As a result, she sometimes caught the fire of international media that depicted her as a face of the apartheid regime. In support of the boycott, the United Kingdom and Australia refused to accept her as part of the obligatory world tour of the Miss World pageant. Welsh singer Shirley Bassey also protested against her receiving the award. However, the United States later relented and Kriel was allowed to make television appearances in the country. In South Africa, her victory at the contest received a rapturous response from both the public, and local media. Upon termination of her term as Miss World, Anneline embarked on other lucrative careers in advertisement and modelling which have since kept her on a busy schedule. Her uprising from a humble mining town not only reveals her zeal for success but also defines her creativity wrapped in her attractive physique. Thereafter, she became an ambassador for several beauty brands, completing public relations activities. She has also starred in several Afrikaans films, soap operas, stage plays and the internationally successful film, Kill and Kill Again which debuted at #2 at the US Box Office. In 1981, Kriel released the pop single, "He Took Off My Romeos" In 2017, the famous Krugerrand-studded dress, which Kriel wore as her National dress, was put on display at the Prins and Prins Diamonds Museum of Gems & Jewellery, in Cape Town for the public to view. In 2018, Kriel added another evening gown to the exhibition that she wore on the evening of the Miss World Pageant in 1974. The dress is also on display at the Prins and Prins Diamonds Museum of Gems & Jewellery. In 2018, Kriel attended the sixtieth Anniversary Celebration of the Miss South African pageant in Pretoria. On 7 September 2019, Kriel was a guest speaker at the annual upgrade of the Witkruis monument between Mokopane and Polokwane South Africa.
Personal life
Kriel was born in Pretoria and was raised in the mining town of Witbank, the daughter of a prison officer. She has two siblings. They finished their education at Hoërskool Generaal Hertzog. As a student, she lived in Huis Asterhof whilst studying Drama at the University of Pretoria. Kriel made one film called "Somer" which was a set book for schools written by CM van den Heever. She also made a television short story in Afrikaans, called "Storieboekmoord". Whilst at university, she became Rag Queen and entered the Miss South Africa competition and won the Miss Northern Transvaal Competition. She won the Miss South Africa title in 1974, and then became Miss World when Helen Morgan of the UK stepped down after just four days. In March 1976, Kriel was embroiled in a scandal over leaked nude photographs that she willingly posed for, and appeared in the media and on the front page of the Sunday Times. Roy Hilligenn took the photographs and sold them to a British newspaper for R100,000. The photos revealed her sunbathing nude on holiday with her naked boyfriend, Richard Loring. Kriel went from being Miss World to be a fashion model and worked in Italy for five years. She worked as the Birra Peroni model in television and magazine adds. She also worked as a model in Paris and New York with Johnny Casablanca Model Management Agency. Kriel has also made efforts to learn the French and Italian languages. Kriel returned to South Africa from New York to marry Sol Kerzner in 1980. She divorced five years later and married Philip Tucker in Johannesburg, where they lived and had two children; Tayla and Witney. They divorced nine years later in 1994. Kriel married Peter Bacon 28 March 1996, the CEO and former protege of Kerzner. The couple currently reside in Mauritius. Kriel and Sol Kerzner sought an interdict against Jonathan Ball Publishers Ltd. and Allan Breenblo over Breenblo's Kerzner Unauthorised, an unauthorised biography of Kerzner. They claimed that the content would infringe on their reputations. In 2007, Kriel, a Goldin family friend, attended the murder trials for the killers of actor Brett Goldin and fashion designer, Richard Bloom. In 2017, Kriel suggested that then-President of South Africa Jacob Zuma face charges of crimes against humanity in the International Criminal Court for failing to protect farmers in South Africa.
