NEWS

Original Source: www.thepeninsulaqatar.com, 12 July 2011

http://tinyurl.com/6923k9o

The Qatari team has won the World Schools Debate Academy tournament held in Slovenia recently, besides the three best speaker wards.

In the finals the proposition team Qatar 1 won over opposition German team. It was judged to be an excellent debate on a very difficult motion, that a conscious consumer does more for democracy than a voter.

The winning debaters were Yousef Fakru, Majid Al Ansari and Safa Kashi, participated in this preparation tournament held in advance to the International School debate championship to be held in Scotland in August. While, Qatari students Mariam Asfia, Saba Kashif and Shaeema Faizan were among the 10 best speakers.

A total of 12 students from the Qatar debate participated in the tournament in four different groups and in the finals.

The program had over 130 participants from 19 nations, including Macedonia, Italy, Sweden, Ireland, Serbia, Bosnia, Croatia, Germany, Venezuela, Lithuania, Romania, Slovenia, the USA, Italy, Hong Kong and UK.

Motions for the tournament included, Voting should be obligatory, Require large online social networks to be controlled democratically by their users and the exploration and development of outer space should be done by an international organization.

In quarterfinals students debated on ‘Children should be excluded from any religion until adulthood’ and on ‘Representative democracy has failed us’ in semifinals.

The Qatari student debaters were also participated in workshops and training sessions held in the sidelines of the tournament to improve their debate skills, exchange of ideas, freedom of expression and to respect the opposition view.

All Qatari participants for the tournament were selected from the QatarDebate, member of the Qatar Foundation.

Throughout the year, QatarDebate organizes a host of opportunities for student debaters to compete and evolve. Debaters from both secondary schools and universities get to battle it out in Debate Leagues. As a grand finale to the year, the finest speakers will go head to head in the National Championships.