By Norhaspin Ajib
KUALA LUMPUR, 27 November 2015: Malaysia’s debating team won the Cambridge inter-varsity debating competition (IV), one of the world’s most competitive, held on 13 and 14 November recently.
It was making history for the International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM) and University Teknologi MARA (UiTM) when both universities emerged champion through great performance by Sara Rahim, Ameera Natasha, Mohd Mifzal Mohd Murshid and Jasmine Ho.
While UiTM won in the main category IIUM championed the English as Second Language (ESL) category.
The debating competition attracted about 128 best teams from various universities all over the world including Harvard University, Oxford University, The London School of Economics, Tel Aviv University, Cornell University, and University of Toronto.
UiTM won in the four way grand finals against the teams from Trinity College of Dublin Historical Society and two teams from the University of Toronto Hart House A & B when they successfully defended the motion “This House believes that the international community should pay countries near to conflict zones to process, settle and restrict the further movement of refugees” in their position as opening government, The Star online reported.
The debaters Sara Rahim and Ameera Natasha defended as opening opposition, “This House believes that Saudi Arabia should limit participation in the Hajj to the citizens of countries that are committed to taking direct action against the Islamic state (IS)”, defeating Tel Aviv from Israel and Leiden A and Leiden B both from the Netherlands for the ESL category.
Prime Minister of Malaysia, Dato’ Sri Mohd Najib Tun Razak congratulated all the winners in his Facebook page posting last Tuesday.
Malaysians expressed their proud feelings in the social media following announcement of the winners of the inter-varsities debating competition. ***
Photo of The Star Online