Week when Joshua arap Sang turned court translator in his ICC trial

From Left: Lawyer Katwa Kigen, ICC accused radio journalist Joshua arap Sang and lawyer Joel Bosek outside the ICC courts in past proceedings. Last week, the three came to the aid of the judges by translating witness account from Kalenjin to English. [Photo: File/Standard]

By Wahome Thuku

Kenya: Language barrier hindered proceedings in the trial of Deputy President William Ruto and Radio journalist Joshua arap Sang at the International Criminal Court (ICC) last week.

On two days, the Trial-Chamber V(a) experienced a hitch in the translation of evidence from Kalenjin dialect to Kiswahili and to English.

Many a times, Kenyan lawyers Katwa Kigen and Joel Bosek had to come to the aid of the Prosecution, and even the accused, Mr Sang, offered a hand. “We know this is not your job and we are truly grateful for your assistance to the Chamber,” Judge Osuji told Mr Kigen and Mr Bosek.The epitome of barrier occurred in the transition of Kalenjin phrases used by witness number 409, who began testifying on Thursday.

The witness, a resident of Nandi Hills, testifying in Swahili narrated how Mr Ruto and former Cabinet Minister Henry Kosgey used Kalenjin parables to incite members of the community to violence in 2007.

The three judges have been comfortably relying on court interpreters to translate evidence from Kiswahili to English. But the problem arose when the witness used Kalenjin words, which he said were coded parables used by Ruto and Mr Kosgey at different ODM rallies in Nandi Hills in October 2007, to urge the community to evict other tribes from the region.

Kalenjin words

The witness, though not a Kalenjin, said he understands Kalenjin very well. Ruto’s lawyer Karim Khan consistently demanded that the witness be made to pronounce the actual Kalenjin words spoken by his client before the translation could be recorded.

The first words said to have been used by Kosgey and Ruto were, makimoche ketit ne kiibu chumbek meaning; “We don’t want the tree that was brought by the white man.”

The witness said he understood the words to refer to those people who worked for the white man; the Luhya, Kikuyu and the Kisii.

The witness further said the two politicians used the words; kimache kesich ketit tugul ne kiibu chumbek meaning; “The trees should be uprooted,” which the witness understood to mean that the non-Kalenjin should be removed from the area.

The witness told the judges that further, Kosgey used another parable “ometai suswek kolanda agoi got” (you have allowed grass to grow up to your houses).

He understood him to be referring to the other tribes who had bought land in the area. Every time the witness switched to Kalenjin, Kigen and Bosek offered to assist in the translation as officers of the court, but did it in a process keenly verified by the prosecution and the judges.

When the witness pronounced the remarks in Kalenjin, lawyer Bosek would repeat them and ask him to confirm if they were the words he had used.