Mona Lewis: 'I wouldn't have worked for Sir Alan'

Mona Lewis: 'I wouldn't have worked for Sir Alan'
Mona Lewis: 'I wouldn't have worked for Sir Alan' (Image credit: Talkback Thames)

Mona Lewis has said she was relieved to be fired from The Apprentice by Sir Alan Sugar as she wouldn't want to work for him anyway. The Karachi-born former beauty queen said that if she had won the competition she would not have uprooted son Ryan, six, to move to London. The episode saw Mona on the losing team Empire, led by Debra Barr. The teams were tasked with re-branding the seaside town of Margate, and Empire went for the gay market, despite objections from Mona, who thought targeting families would draw a broader audience. On sacking her, Sir Alan said: "Mona, I don't see any creativity here and I have to start thinking about where you would slot into my organisation." But senior business manager Mona, 28, who lives in Kent, said: "Even if I'd done extremely well and I'd got through the final, I think I would have disappointed Sir Alan because I don't think I would have uprooted him and me. "It's hard enough being in a country not knowing many people, and once you've built a network of people... and then go to London and start again, it's not easy." Mona said: "When I got fired and I was in the cab I just kept saying: 'I'm so delighted, I'm going home.' "Unlike the other candidates, I did have a silver lining to go back to - and I went in there for him and I got out of there for him."

Patrick McLennan

Patrick McLennan is a London-based journalist and documentary maker who has worked as a writer, sub-editor, digital editor and TV producer in the UK and New Zealand. His CV includes spells as a news producer at the BBC and TVNZ, as well as web editor for Time Inc UK. He has produced TV news and entertainment features on personalities as diverse as Nick Cave, Tom Hardy, Clive James, Jodie Marsh and Kevin Bacon and he co-produced and directed The Ponds, which has screened in UK cinemas, BBC Four and is currently available on Netflix. 


An entertainment writer with a diverse taste in TV and film, he lists Seinfeld, The Sopranos, The Chase, The Thick of It and Detectorists among his favourite shows, but steers well clear of most sci-fi.