Reaching new heights

Gymnasium debaters obtain great awards at Orate Africa
Mariselle Stofberg
Lelan Beukes

From 10 to 15 December 2019, 5 Windhoek Gymnasium learners participated in Orate Africa.

For the first time ever, Orate Africa 2019 League 2 was hosted by Namibia at the University of Namibia. The competition is one of Africa’s most competitive tournaments, and was known as Books Botswana before it was renamed Orate Africa. “Since team Namibia had a history of losing in the semifinals for the past 3 years, the team put their hearts and souls into preparing for the competition in order to be crowned the champions of Orate Africa 2019,” says Clinton Muinjo one of the Namibian team coaches. Even though the competition had a high turnout from countries such as Zimbabwe, Kenya and Botswana, all the top 10 best overall speakers were from Namibia.

Furthermore, Windhoek Gymnasium debaters made the school proud. Windhoek Gymnasium had 5 debaters in the Namibian team: Tafadzwa Bopoto, Iris Shimhanda, Ernst Calitz, Naame Williams and Lelan Beukes. Tafadzwa Bopoto, a grade 8 learner last year, was 10th best overall speaker on the tab and Best Novace speaker. Ernst Calitz, a grade 12 learner last year, obtained 3rd Best Overall speaker. Naame Williams not only obtained Best Overall speaker at Orate Africa 2019 but she was also the Best Namibian debater at the tournament. Lelan Beukes received the grant Pisat award (awarded to someone who does a great deal of things at the tournament). The learners really worked hard at the tournament and made Windhoek Gymnasium proud. All this was possible because of the exposure Windhoek Gymnasium offers its learners.

Moreover, the debaters at Windhoek Gymnasium have the best debating coaches. Windhoek Gymnasium’s previous debate coach Cliff Simataa is well known as the Best University debater, not only in Africa but internationally too. He coached Windhoek Gymnasium debaters for over 3 years and our debaters have been obtaining great awards since day one. “The debaters from Windhoek Gymnasium performed exceptionally well. Two of them formed part of the team in the finals and the best speaker from the tournament was from Gymnasium as well. Furthermore, even the junior speakers did exceptionally well. This performance does not come as a surprise to me at all. It validated my belief that Windhoek Gymnasium is the best debating school in the country,” says Cliff Simataa.

In conclusion, Gymnasium’s debaters have been keeping the school’s name high and we look forward to new achievements from our champions.