The Inquirer Foundation of the Philippine Daily Inquirer facilitated an Inter-School Debate Competition joined by 22 Junior High Schools in Valenzuela City as part of their advocacies and goals for the youth to be mindful of fake news by getting their information only from credible sources.

The Valenzuela City School of Mathematics and Science (ValMaSci) controlled the business as they secure the sweet spot on the INQskwela: Inter-School Debate Finals, having a total average of 86.67% against the Paso De Blas National High School (PDBNHS) Friday, June 10, 2022, eventuates in ValMaSci.

The ValMaSci team received PhP 2,000 and a Samsung Tablet 8.0 per team member. Along with the prizes for first place, the ValMaSci pulled all the special awards from the said competition. Iver John Delos Santos (ValMaSci) won the Best Debater award, Joaquin Iñigo Castillejos (ValMaSci) as the Best Rebuttal Speaker, and Nico Sebastian Roque (ValMaSci) is awarded as the Best Speaker of the debate. 

The Inquirer Foundation through the Philippine Daily Inquirer, made a partnership with the Department of Education – Valenzuela (DepEd) to promote social awareness among the Valenzuelano students. In line with this, the proposition that the two teams argued about was the “Criminalization of False Speech”, whether it is unconstitutional or the current existing laws in the country aren’t enough. 

Quoting from Article III, section 4 of the 1987 Constitution, “No law shall be passed abridging the freedom of speech, of expression, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble and petition the government for a redress of grievances”, Mauren Dijamco, one of the debaters from team ValmaSci, shared her sentiments about the level of assurance we have on government in implementing such law. 

“There is no guarantee that criminalizing false speech, [the] government will only focus on what they think is false… second is, it will create a chilling effect, [it] will prevent the Filipino people from exercising their legal rights, in fact, one of these legal rights is exercising their freedom of speech. People will hesitate to speak [and] to express themselves if we criminalized false speech,” Dijamco added.

Valenzuela City School of Mathematics and Science (ValMaSci) obtained the championship belt among the 33 other junior and senior high schools that also took their shot for the title.

The Inquirer Foundation: INQskwela will continue and hopes to reach for a more significant number of students and to have more collaboration projects with the City of Valenzuela as well as giving free workshops for every student that could be a good attribute for them. 

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