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MANILA – Pia Wurtzbach finally broke her silence and addressed rumors that she supposedly did not want Catriona Gray to win Miss Universe back in 2018 because she felt "threatened" by her.

In an interview with Gulf News in Dubai, Wurtzbach said there is no truth to those claims, adding that she was even in Thailand on the day Gray was crowned Miss Universe.

"I was there in Thailand when she won. I was actually like, almost in the front row. It's so nice to see it from the audience's point of view because I've been there as a contestant, I've been there as a judge, but it was my first time to be there as an audience member where I'm literally there just to experience it. I don't have any responsibility to judge the girls, to write anything down, to be too critical. I'm just there to enjoy," she said.

"People would say to me before, 'She's threatened because she doesn't want another Filipina from the Philippines to win.' But once you're there, all of that goes out of the window because you just want to raise the flag," she added.

Wurtzbach said there's no way she could not have wished for Gray to win because like everybody else, "you just want the Philippines to win."

"Everybody's so happy. How can you be the bitter one? Why would you want to ruin the party?" she said.

Meanwhile, Wurtzbach shared how her life has been after her reign as Miss Universe in 2015.

"After you win, you got to work twice as hard to stay relevant. The peak is the win, and then the reign. After that, you got to work twice as hard to keep yourself up there, to keep yourself relevant and in the public eye," she said.

While saying she does not do "any weird gimmicks" to make people talk about her, Wurtzbach said she tries to stay relevant by continuing the work she's passionate about.

"I still do activities like this where I get invited abroad," she said. "The work continues, basically. This was my dream. It's not difficult if you love what you do."

Wurtzbach was in Dubai to receive her Woman of the Year award from the luxury magazine Xpedition, making her the second Filipino to be proclaimed as such.

For its first edition in September 2019, XAGA gave the award to Gray.

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