Kenya’s next generation of legal experts provided evidence of their debating skills as part of a competition hosted by a leading UK university.
Pupils from 12 schools in Nairobi and Mombasa made their cases in a mock courtroom as the University of Dundee hosted its second Kenyan High School Mooting Competition.
Teams of four young people were asked to debate a fictitious problem relating to a dispute between neighbours. Using sophisticated legal arguments dealing with private law and human rights issues, St. Austin’s Academy were named winners, defeating pupils from Oshwal Academy in the final.
Each member of the winning team received a £5,000 Global Excellence Scholarship for each year of Dundee’s three year English Law LLB and a voucher for 10,000 KSH. The runners-up received a one year £5,000 Global Excellence Scholarship for Dundee’s three year English Law LLB and a voucher for 5,000 KSH.
Professor Peter McEleavy, Barrister, Professor of Law and Academic Lead for Sub-Saharan Africa at the University of Dundee, said, “The legal world can be incredibly complicated yet our Kenyan High School Mooting Competition has shown how capable Kenya’s next generation of legal professionals already are. “The standard of mooting was incredibly high and the teams did an exceptional job of representing themselves and their schools. The University of Dundee is one of the best universities in the UK to study Law and I am excited about the possibility of welcoming more Kenyans to Dundee to further their legal education.”
The University of Dundee has a growing number of Kenyan students studying in what is known as Scotland’s sunniest city. Recently, The Guardian newspaper ranked Dundee fourth in the UK for Law, behind only Cambridge, Oxford and University College London.