Trump Mispronounces Names of Two African Leaders in Their Presence

During a ceremony in Washington on Thursday aimed at advancing a peace agreement between two African nations, Donald Trump praised the leaders of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Rwanda as courageous, but faltered when trying to say their names correctly.

Trump attempted to introduce Congolese President Felix Tshisekedi, saying, President Ja-secky-theh-eh, of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, visibly struggling with the pronunciation. He followed by addressing Rwandan President Paul Kagame as President Keh-goo-may.

The correct pronunciations are Chi-Sek-Ed-dee for Tshisekedi and Kah-Gah-May for Kagame. When he had to mention Tshisekedi again, Trump avoided pronouncing the name and referred to him simply as president of D.R.C.

This is not the first instance of Trump mispronouncing foreign names. Last month, during a White House dinner with leaders from Central Asia, he incorrectly pronounced Kazakhstan as Ka-ZACK-a-stan while announcing the countrys participation in the Abraham Accords.

In 2017, Trump also mistakenly referred to a nonexistent African country as Nambia in a meeting with regional leaders. Despite these errors, he often improvises language when faced with difficult words, creating terms such as bigly, ana-nomish, and the infamous covfefe.

Author: Aiden Foster