IDEA Asia Youth Forum: Jacques and his angels take Mixed Team Championship trophy

Team Jacques’ Angels emerged champions of the Mixed Team Tournament in the first Asian Youth Forum 2012 on May 26.

The team made up of Jacques Ian David Estola (Philippines), Kajal Kadmiya (Nepal) and Suzan defeated Team Why Not in the finals held in Bangkok.

Estola has nothing but gratitude for his teammates.

“I’m like an angel. And I’m proud of my angels. It feels like my angels brought me to heaven,” said the 20-year-old.

He and his teammates, Kadmiya and Suzan, aged 18 and 19 respectively, were so ecstatic after they were announced the winners that they were almost speechless.

“It feels like I’m dreaming!” said Kadmiya, aged 18.

Suzan, 19, said: “I can’t say a word. It feels like I’m flying!”

Their team was the Negative side while Team Why Not was the Affirmative. The motion for the Mixed Team Track Finals Motion was “State should not use labor export as a major economic strategy”.

Why Not was made up of Hak Sreynith (Cambodia), Navarerk Kaewphakdee (Thailand), Roma.

The slots for the top six speakers of the MTT were taken by participants from Pakistan and the Philippines.

Pakistanis Murtaza Chaudhry from Team Universe, Aleena Ali from Team Synergy and Zainab Shahid from Team Yellow took the first, second and fourth positions.

While Filipinos John Alfred Dalag from Team John Iapan, Estola and Joseph James Bacayo from Team Incredible took the third, fifth and sixth positions.

Aleena, Zainab Shahid, both 17 and Murtaza Chaudhry,18, emerged winners of the first Asian Karl Popper Championship in Pattaya on May 18. Aleena was named the Top Speaker, Zainab the runner-up and Mustaza the fifth best in that tournament. All three are from Lahore.

Mustaza and Zainab were speechless when asked how they felt over their win.

Aleena, however, said that the three of them will be competing with each other from now on and their first competition will be the upcoming World Schools Debating Championship in Turkey.

Coach Haider Khan, aged 24, was amazed that the team had won so many awards.

“It’s hard work. They practised had and did a lot of research,” he said.

The Filipinos were just as thrilled.

Dalag, 19 from Cebu City, said: “It was inspiring and humbling, because before this, we have faced a lot of trials and we never expected to be given this award.”

Bacayo, 19, also from Cebu City, said: “I’m very flattered because I was chosen to be one of the best speakers after failing to do so during the KPDC category.”

Judges in the grand finals panel were Akira Kohbara (Japan), Bryan Gunawan (Indonesia), Margo Loor (Estonia), Kamala Veni (Malaysia), Noura Mansour (Palestine), Linfei Zhu (China), Sharon Porter (US) and Harry Choi (Korea). The panel was chaired by Angie Goh Sze Ying (Malaysia).

The prizes were given out by Dr Coeli Maria Barry, senior adviser at the Culture and Rights in Thailand Project at The Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn Centre, and IDEA Asia Youth Forum Director Chirada Na Suwan.

Na Suwan said in her speech at the awards presentation ceremony that the participants all demonstrated greater understanding and learned from each other through sharing and empowering

“Aside from debating, they learned about cultural differences,” she added.

Tournament director Bryan Gunawan was happy with the above average improvement.

“This is amazing. I didn’t expect this. The participants were generally trying hard and this was evident in their speeches,” he said.

About 164 young people from 10 Asian countries attended the Asian Karl Popper Debate Championship 2012. This is the first time IDEA is holding the event at Asian level after 17 years of hosting international youth forums.

The tournament saw the participation of 86 young judges and coaches and 78 debaters between the ages of 14 and 19.

The Asian Youth Forum 2012 was held in partnership with United Thailand at the Thammasat Pattaya Center in Chon Buri and Rangsit University in Bangkok.

It was held from May 14 to 18, the first part of the two-week long IDEA Asia Youth Forum 2012. The forum also includes a four-day educational workshop and Mixed Team Tournament.

The International Debate Education Association or IDEA is a global network with over a decade of experience of teaching debate to young people.

The theme for the Asian Youth Forum 2012 is Crossing Borders: Migration in Asia.

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