Just a month into the new Academic Year (and new moot season), SMU’s moot team has done Singapore proud at the 12^th edition of the LawAsia International Moot Competition, bringing back the championship trophy for the fourth time!  SMU also won Best Memorials, matching the double it won last year, as well as the 1st-runner-up award for Best Oralist (Wayne Yeo).

The competition this year saw 37 teams participating, with the best 16 teams gathering in Tokyo, Japan, between 18 and 21 September 2017 for the international rounds.  SMU’s triumphant trio – third-year law students Andrew Chia, Claire Lim and Wayne Yeo – achieved top spot after nine grueling rounds of competition.

The moot problem this year was about an arbitration case between a Japanese company and a Myanmar company in the jade business, disputing over the validity of an alleged partnership agreement and the ownership of equipment and software.

The SMU team had qualified for the knockouts as one of the top seeds in a field that comprised universities with strong mooting traditions, such as West Bengal State University, Jodhpur University, and the National University of Singapore.  It then won all of its matches en-route to the final round held on 21 September.

Notably, this is the seventh time SMU has appeared in the championship final of this Moot and it is the fourth time we have won the title (previously in 2013, 2014 and 2016).  The team was coached by School of Law (SOL) alumna Nanthini Vijayakumar, who had also won the moot as a student in 2013 and as a coach in 2016, and co-coached by fellow SOL alumnus Qabir Sandhu.  With this win, SMU now has 22 championship titles in 42 championship finals in all international moot competitions.

Well done!

[Featured photo: Coaches Nanthini Vijayakumar (far right) and Qabir Sandhu (far left) with the triumphant trio from SMU School of Law - Andrew Chia, Wayne Yeo and Claire Lim.]