The East African Legislative Assembly (Eala) has declined to approve a $5 million vote for translation and interpretation services in the East African Community budget for 2023/2024, saying the EAC Treaty only recognises English as the bloc’s official language.
The EAC Council of Ministers who met on August 14 failed to resolve the matter, with the Democratic Republic of Congo demanding that the EAC Secretariat include funds for translation and interpretation services in the already approved budget.
“Other partner states led by Tanzania, ought to stick to the approved budgetary ceilings,” said the Secretariat.
Rebecca Miano, Kenya’s Cabinet Secretary for the EAC, told The EastAfrican that DRC wants inclusion of services for interpretation and translation into French, which would breach the ceiling, but said the team is still consulting to find a resolution.
“We have an approval process for the 2023/24 budget. The Council of Ministers had approved the budget, but Eala wanted to rearrange the budget… we are trying to resolve that so we can implement the budget,” she said.
“We are still holding discussions on the matter, as you know, within the EAC there has to be consensus before a matter is agreed upon,” the minister said.
The Eala General Purpose Committee declined to approve the allocation for translation of English into French and Kiswahili on the grounds that under the current EAC Treaty, which has not been reviewed since its launch in 1999, the official language of the Community is English.
Although Kiswahili and French have been cleared as official languages of the bloc, English remains the working language for day-to-day transactions.
“The Summit passed a resolution and directed the Council to put up modalities to ensure that French and Kiswahili become official languages of the Community,” said Denis Namara, a Uganda MP and a member of the General Purpose Committee.
“The Treaty is clear on what the official language is. So the work of the Council is to ensure the Summit amends it for those two languages to become official languages of the Community. There is no way they can become official languages when the Treaty does not provide for them.”
Mr Namara blamed the EAC Secretariat for bringing up the matter in the assembly 10 days to the end of the financial year.
“There is no way on Earth that the Secretary-General and those who are concerned could have procured the equipment 10 days to the end of the financial year,” Mr Namara said.
He also argued that there was no money to allocate, as DRC has not even paid its due contributions.
“That money was supposed to come from DRC. The DRC had not paid and has not paid up to now. So, we directed that the money be put in the general reserve account so that if they want it to be appropriated, they bring it up in the next financial year. But they should also fast track the amendments of the Treaty. This does not take a long time. The Summit can meet and amend the Treaty even in one day,” the MP said.
