Filipino teams dominate Asian debate tilt prelims

MANILA, Philippines - Seven teams from the Philippines made it to the top 16 of the fourth United Asian Debating Championship (UADC) after dominating the preliminary rounds of one of Asia's biggest debate tournaments.

Two teams from the Ateneo de Manila University (ADMU) and a team each from the University of the Philippines Diliman (UPD), UP Manila, University of Santo Tomas, Xavier University and De La Salle University garnered the highest points to make it to the top 16 of the tournament, which concludes with the grand final round on Wednesday. The revolving tournament is jointly hosted this year by ADMU and UPD.

Five teams from Singapore and four teams from Malaysia similarly made it to the cut from a pool of 80 teams from 60 institutions all over Asia.

The 16 teams proceeded to the octofinals and quarterfinals on Tuesday, with ADMU and UPD emerging as winners alongside the International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM) and the National University of Singapore (NUS).

ADMU and UPD will face off in the semifinal round on Wednesday, while IIUM and NUS will compete against each other.

Winners from both matches will finally face in the grand final, where a Filipino team is already secured a slot. ADMU previously won the tournament in 2010 held in Bangkok, Thailand.