ATENEO DEBATE Society (ADS) representatives won the gold in the Philippine Inter-Collegiate Debating Championship (PIDC) 2014 after defeating the University of the Philippines-Diliman (UPD) during the finals round held on April 7 at the Asian Development Bank.
The ADMU A team composed of Allan Cabrera (BS AMF ‘14), senior Inah Robles and junior Bharat Keswani won the Ateneo its first PIDC crown since 2010 and its fourth PIDC championship in the competition’s eight-year history.
ADS sent a delegation of five teams: ADMU A, B, C, D and E. ADMU B was made up of junior Mike Agoncillo, and seniors Nicolo Fortuna and Daryl Isla. ADMU C was formed by juniors Miko Alazas, Azi Dela Paz and Rafael Zagala. Meanwhile, juniors Andrea Guevarra, Denise Recomono and Paolo Tabuena comprised ADMU D, while junior Samantha Atilano, and sophomores JB Capucao and Frances Robles were part of ADMU E.
The PIDC is a national debate competition set in the Asian Parliamentary Debate format. This year’s tilt featured 60 teams from 22 institutions in the country.
The motions for the debates were centered on themes such as feminism, socio-legal issues, sports, economics, religion, media, geopolitics and technology.
The participating teams went through seven preliminary rounds that reduced the roster to 16 teams that competed in the Finals Series. The Finals Series included the octofinals, quarterfinals, semi-finals, and the final round of the competition.
The ADMU B, C and D teams advanced to the octofinals.
The preliminary rounds and the octofinals were held at UPD from April 2 to 6 while the rest of the Finals Series were held on April 7.
For the individual awards, Robles and Cabrera were declared as Best Speaker of the tournament and Finals Best Speaker, respectively.
Cabrera was also named as 3rd Best Speaker of the competition. Keswani, meanwhile, was hailed the 5th Best Speaker and Agoncillo was named the 9th Best Speaker.
Two ADS representatives who acted as judges in the competition, namely junior Ilkka Russo and sophomore Matt San Pedro, qualified to adjudicate in the finals. Russo was declared as 7th Best Adjudicator of the tournament.
The ADMU A team will be competing in the United Asians Debate Championship (UADC) to be held on May in Singapore. The UADC is the largest Asian Parliamentary Debate competition in Asia, with competing teams coming from Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and India, among others.
Last argument
The motion for the final round was focused on development: “This house supports leaders of disenfranchised communities telling their members that hard work is the way to poverty alleviation.”
As the opposition, ADMU A argued that the marginalized should challenge oppressive structures in society which would lead to the realization of their hard work.
“These oppressive structures include contractualization of labor, imbalance of opportunities in the educational system, and the skewed valuation of white collared labor and blue collared labor,” explained Robles in an interview with The GUIDON.
UPD then posed that disenfranchised individuals need to be told to work hard so they can transcend these oppressive structures.
Robles further said that their team debunked this by emphasizing their stand that “poor individuals do work hard but the lens in which their efforts are appreciated must be challenged in order to recognize their hard work.”
On debate and fuelling the mind
This year, PIDC carried the theme “Fuel the Filipino Mind.”
In an interview with The GUIDON, Keswani said that the theme “pushes Filipinos to understand issues around the world while being critical about how people perceive these issues.”
Meanwhile, Robles said that the way to fuel the mind is through discourse and debate.
She said debate allows people to rethink their views and question norms. “It is this re-evaluation of society that is beneficial because progress comes only at the point in which norms are challenged.”
For Cabrera, competitive debating has allowed him to broaden his world view and to
understand the various dimensions of contemporary issues.
“It has made me more aware of current events and also more critical about many things that are often taken for granted,” he said.
