2017 Expression Debate: How University of Ibadan Steals Show

The University of Ibadan is called the home of public speaking and this was once again proved in the just concluded Expression Debate organised by the Young Stars Foundation, as the three teams that qualified from UI to the finals came 1^st 2^nd and 4^th, out of the 32 teams that participated.

Adeyemi Idowu, a 500 level Law student and Thanni Obafemi, a 200 level Philosophy student, both representing UI, emerged winners, while Adesokan Adediran and Nwagbara Izuchukwu, both 3^rd year law students  at Ibadan emerged first runner-ups. Then, Adeyemo Victor and Asundemade Habeeb, also representing UI, jointly clinched the fourth position, bringing the number of UI students in the first positions to six.

The Expression Debate, organised by the Young Stars Foundation featured five rounds. The first round was opened to all students of any tertiary institution in Nigeria, where intending participants were made to form a team of two, with each team recording a minute video on a debate topic of their choice, sent to a YouTube link provided by the organisers of the competition.

From the first round, only a few teams were invited to the next round, which was the regional audition. From all the teams that participated in this round, only 32 teams made it to the finals. 12 teams qualified from the South West and 10 each from both the North and the East.

The final of the Expression debate, which held in Abuja, the Federal Capital, started on the 7^th of December with the 32 teams competing against one another. From the first stage (Quarter Finals), only 16 teams qualified to the semi-finals; and out of the 16 teams that participated in this stage, only 8 teams made it to the final stage of the final rounds. These 8 teams went head to head with one another, and the three teams with the highest scores emerged the first, second and the third.

Adeyemi Idowu and Thanni Obafemi of team Quora emerged the overall winner of the debate competition and they were rewarded with the cash prize of the whooping sum of 500,000 naira, while Adesokan Adediran and Nwagbara Izuchukwu of team Dunamis emerged as the first runner-up and were rewarded with the cash prize of 300,000 naira. The team that came third were University of Nsukka students and were given the cash prize of 200,000 naira.