NTUMUN
Two representatives from the NY Debate Society recently participated in the Nanyang Technological University Model United Nations (NTUMUN) 2008 from 1st to 3rd Feb. The MUN camp provides a simulated environment for local and international college/university students to debate on issues faced by the past and present UN.
We were divided into five groups each debating on a particular topic. The five sections are, Security Council, Historical Security Council, General Assembly (GA), International Monetary Fund and International Atomic Energy Agency.
In this MUN, I represented Somalia in the GA, the largest of all with about 50 delegates. The topic of discussion which was released to us a month in advance was “ (Tackling) Climate Change”. The first impression I had was, what has a Third-World country strifed with decades of civil wars got to do with climate change? Well, it turns out, things were not as straightforward as it seemed.
This MUN streamlines the usually bureaucratic approaches and goes straight into suggestion of ideas and constructive debating. For the purposes of this MUN, some delegates prepared ideas in the form of working papers. These working paper would then go through a round of debating by the entire assembly, undergoing amendments if necessary before being voted on. If successful, ideas from the paper will be incorporated into the Resolution at the end.
One may get a perception this is simple. In the MUN, its common even for seemingly minor points to explode into major contentions. Delegates also had to ensure the accuracy of the factual data they propose. Sometimes, even the sources of those data could turn into major flashpoints (A similar incident actually happened to Malaysia at the International Court of Justice).
To a layman, all this does seem very troublesome. Well, this is an almost exact replica of the situation in the UN, except it is simplified. To make things as realistic as possible, the organisers even added a sample situation with real time limit. The situation was about the US finally agreeing to sign the Kyoto Protocol under conditional terms (See links at the end for details).
As they say, we leave the best for the last. The most active debate was at the finale, during the Resolution.
Delegates fighting for their points to be included in the Resolution.
Resolution passed!
In the end, all the hard work and intense discussions over the two days cumulated in this Resolution. In reality, things are not that simple. A single idea can take months and countless hours of council sessions just to get it approved. In the MUN, we passed more than 10 working papers in a total of 15.5 hours of sessions. This is a practical impossibility in actual scenario. One really can appreciate the lives of the many politicians that represent us.
A small group photo. (The official photos have not been released)
So this closes the book of the NTU Model United Nations 2008. My experience cannot be simply described in words here. You can only guess the magnitude of the stuff I gained here. For those who are interested, I strongly suggest you join this next year. I believe NTUMUN 2009 will be more fun. Visit here for details.
For the in-depth issues and topics we discussed in the MUN, see the links below
Day 1 (Brief Intro to event)
Day 2 (Beginning of intense discussion)
Day 3 (Continuation from Day 2 and winding down of events)
By Yeo Kheng Meng