AFIA TRAINERS

Elisabeth KOUAOVI is a national of Niger. She graduated from the Université de Mons, Belgium in 1989, in Translation (French, English, Spanish, Arabic). She added Portuguese in 1990 and trained as a Conference Interpreter at the Polytechnic of Central London in 1991/92. She worked as a Freelance Interpreter in Brussels, including at the European Parliament from 1992 to 1997.

Back to Niger in 1998 she has worked extensively as a FL interpreter for the Niger Government (including the Presidency) and many national and international organisations, such as ECOWAS, AU, ECA, ADB, and the UN system.

She obtained her MAS in Interpreter Training from the ETI, University of Geneva in 2009 and joined the team of trainers of the MACINT Programme, University of Ghana, in September 2013, where she designed several innovations, including an IT module for interpreters. She has done two mandates as Regional Secretary of the International Association of Conference Interpreters (AIIC), has been Coordinator of the AIIC-Africa Training Committee and is currently member of the AIIC Discipline and Dispute Committee (since Jan 2018).

In June 2018, she joined WHO/AFRO as Manager of the Translation, interpretation and Printing Unit.

Her areas of interest and research are Interpretation training, IT and Science.

Marie DIUR  joined the United Nations Office at Geneva as Chief of the Interpretation Service in December 2017, after nearly ten years at the United Nations Office at Vienna, initially as Chief of the French Booth and then as Chief Interpreter. Marie’s thirty year career in interpretation spans over twelve years’ freelance work for UN agencies, the European Union, and the private market up until 2001 when she joined UN Headquarters as a Staff Interpreter.

Marie has been An AIIC member in 1992. In 2001, she joined UN New York as a staff interpreter, became Chief of the French booth at UN Vienna in 2008, where she became Chief Interpreter in 2016. Since 2018 she has been Chief Interpreter at the UN Geneva. She has been a visiting examiner in interpretation schools in France and Belgium (ESIT; ISIT, ISTI; EII; LSTI/Marie-Haps).

Her language portfolio comprises French (A), English, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, and Swedish (C) and is complemented by a Maîtrise en langues étrangères appliquées (Université Toulouse-le-Mirail), a DEA en littérature française, francophone et comparée (Université Bordeaux 3), a Post-graduate Diploma in Conference Interpretation (PCL-London) and a Ph.D. in Humanities (Universidad Pablo de Olavide-Sevilla). 

An ardent advocate of education and development, Marie chairs the IAMLADP Taskforce on Interpreting Issues and is the Outreach Focal Point for Interpretation for United Nations Office in Geneva.

Nina OKAGBUE graduated from Grenoble University with a Political Science Diploma and a Degree in French Language and Literature (France, 1975). She studied for the next two years at the Ecole Supérieure d’Interprètes et de Traducteurs (ESIT), leading to a bilingual MA in Conference Interpretation (English/French) from the Sorbonne Nouvelle, Paris. A working career as an interpreter in Europe and Africa ensued, beginning as a staffer at the African, Caribbean and Pacific States’ Secretariat in Brussels (Belgium), in 1978. 

Following a Master’s in Business Administration (MBA Health, Population and Nutrition) from Keele University (UK, 1992), she went on to a new career in multilateral development banking as a social development expert at the African Development Bank (AfDB, Côte d’Ivoire). 

Originally from Nigeria and a mother of two, Nina Okagbue has travelled extensively throughout East, Central and West Africa in the course of her programme development and institutional capacity building work in poverty reduction, maternal and child health, and social funding. She was a co-recipient of the Mahmoun Beiry Award for Excellence in Change Management Facilitation (AfDB, 2002).

From 2016-2019 she served as Coordinator of the Pan African Masters Consortium in Interpretation and Translation (PAMCIT) at the United Nations Office at Nairobi. Nina now pursues an active training and research career, happily lecturing in MA Interpretation programs (Universities of Ghana and Mozambique) and learning Portuguese.

Paule Kekeh’s extensive professional career dates back to end of 1986 when she started working as a young staff interpreter at the African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States in Brussels, Belgium.

In early 1990, she joined the European Commission in Brussels as a staff interpreter. From 1996 to 1999, she worked as a staff interpreter at the United Nations Headquarters in New York. She came back from New York at the end of 1999 and resumed her career at the European Commission. In 2004, she took part in a staff-exchange programme with the International Monetary Fund.

Paule holds a Diplôme de traducteur trilingue (Masters) highest distinction from the Institut Supérieur d’interprétation de conférence et de traduction, ISIT, PARIS, France (1980-1984) and à Diplôme en interprétation de conférence (D.E.S.S Diplôme d’études spécialisées, 1984-1986)

She is currently a Coordinator Interpreter at the European Commission

Her working languages are : French A, English B, German, Spanish, Swedish and Portuguese C.

Paule has trained interpreters through professional skills development programmes and initial education programmes at university level in Cuba, Europe, and Africa.

Paule is originally from Togo and is a mother of two.

Her hobbies include distance-running, swimming, yoga, reading and photography.

Beatrice MANIGAT (Fr A, ENg B, Sp and Ht Creole C) graduated from the University of Ghana in Conference Interpreting (PAMCIT program). She holds a MPhil ("D.E.A.") in Anglophone studies, specializing in the civilization and literature of the Black Americas and post-Apartheid South Africa (Université Paris 7 and Université de la Réunion).
Born in Paris to Haitian parents, Ms Manigat was raised in successive multilingual environments, thus rapidly acquiring the passion for language mediation in the African Diasporas: France, Trinidad, Venezuela, Haiti, Reunion Island, then The Congo, Togo and Ghana.

Ms Manigat dedicated over 20 years to teaching English in French high schools abroad before deciding to join the PAMCIT program in Ghana and achieve her dream of becoming a Conference Interpreter, trained in Africa. Her MA research dealt with Remote Simultaneous Interpreting whilst her current area of study focuses on the Pan African experience that can be derived from the compilation of material produced in the African Diasporas regarding linguistic policies and independence.

More specifically, her work examines the role of interpreters as they contribute to the building of nations.

Brenda WANGUI is a PAMCIT graduate from the University of Nairobi. She graduated with a Master of Arts in Interpretation in 2015. 

Brenda also has a background in Education, having graduated from Kenyatta University with a Bachelor of Education (B.Ed.).

Her working languages are English A, French, Spanish and Kiswahili (C). 

Following her graduation, she launched into the freelance market in Nairobi, Kenya.

In 2018, Brenda passed her first UN accreditation test which opened up freelance opportunities within various international organizations.

As a trained interpretation trainer, following a Training for Trainers seminar by European Commission DG-SCIC in September 2018, Brenda is now able to combine the knowledge acquired in her two fields of study. She actively volunteers her time in on-line interpreter training courses as an assistant trainer and media enthusiast.

Her field of interest is the use of media in education; a field that has made great strides in the last few months. <

Brenda is from Kenya and lives in Brussels, Belgium.

Clare Donovan studied Conference Interpreting at ESIT in Paris, graduating in 1982. She worked for a number of years as a free-lance interpreter whilst also teaching interpreting at ESIT, and also in Schools elsewhere in Europe, Asia and Africa. 

She completed her PhD in Translation Studies in 1990 before taking up the position of Head of the Conference Interpreting Masters at ESIT in 1992. She held this position for many years before becoming Chief Interpreter at the OECD in 2011.

Clare Donovan’s research interests include training into a B language, the role of recruiters in training and the shift to remote interpreting. 

She has been involved in training projects throughout the world, most notably as co-founder of PAMCIT and PAUTRAIN in Africa and the EMCI in Europe.

 Yaili Meneses graduated from the University of Havana in 1997 to

immediately join the ESTI team (Equipo de Servicios de Traducción e

Interpretación – official team of translators and interpreters),

where she started working as a young staff interpreter for the Cuban

government until 2008.

From August 1999 to August 2007 she benefited from a programme of

intensive courses for training interpreters for the Cuban Ministry of

Foreign Affairs delivered by the Directorate-General for Interpretation

(SCIC) of the EU Commission.

In 2010, she undertook an internship as a conference interpreter in the

African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States in Brussels where she

also collaborated with a training programme for the ACP interpreters

willing to add Spanish to their working languages.

Based in Madrid since 2011, she has worked as a team coordinator and as

an in-house interpreter at Seprotec. She has also worked for 10 years as

a free-lance interpreter whilst teaching English and French in Spanish

high schools.

Yaili has trained interpreters through professional skills development

programmes and at the university level at CESTI, (Centro de Superación

para Traductores e Intérpretes ) from 2007 to 2009 in Havana and

Santiago de Cuba.

She has briefly served as a teaching assistant at the University of La

  Serge Dalli is a PAMCIT-Trained conference interpreter based in Accra, Ghana. He’s been working over the last few years across the African continent for local, regional and global organizations in the French booth (with English B and Portuguese C).

Serge is also one of the rising young trainers passionately teaching conference interpreting techniques and IT-related skills. He’s currently a faculty member at the University of Ghana, Legon and the Ghana Institute of Languages. Hundreds of students and practising interpreters have so far benefitted from his practical teachings and insightful webinars.

Serge Dalli is a member of the PAMCIT-Alumni Network, the Ghana Association of Translators and Interpreters (GATI) and The American Association of Language Specialists (TAALS). 

Moudachirou Gbadamassi is a translator and conference interpreter

member of AIIC and the Francophone Network of Translators and

interpreters (REFTIC), working at the ECOWAS Commission in Abuja.

ECOWAS Commission in Abuja. Before becoming a staff member, Moudachirou worked freelance for several international organizations, including the African Development the African Development Bank, the International Monetary Fund

the African Union, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, the

Islamic Development Bank, etc... Moudachirou has for

combination: French A, English B and Arabic B. In 2009, he created the

MLI, a language institute promoting language professions, where

linguistic professions, where several foreign and Beninese languages are taught.and Beninese languages. Coach Moudachirou Gbadamassi is the author of the book "The Use of Proverbs in African Literature the Case Study of A Dance of the Forests by Wole Soyinka". He enjoys reading, writing, music

and is very active in the cultural world.

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

  Essi Njanda French A, English B, Spanish and Portuguese C joined the Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States (previously ACP Group) in Brussels, Belgium, in 2009. She started her career in 2006 as an in-house translator and interpreter working for the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA), in Accra Ghana. She has been an AIIC member since 2015.

Essi holds a four-year diploma in translation studies (English, French and Spanish) from the School of Translators affiliated to the University of Ghana, Legon and a Masters of Arts in interpreting and translation from the University of Bradford, UK.

She briefly served as a teaching assistant on the Masters in Translation and interpretation of the Universidade Pedagogica of Maputo in Mozambique in 2015. She has also visited PAMCIT classes for talks in Nairobi, Kenya and Accra, Ghana. Since December 2020, she regularly assists the Pan-African Master in Conference Interpreting students as a trainer during online sessions organised by the Directorate General for Interpretation of the European Commission. Throughout her career at the OACPS, Essi has always been available to mentor budding interpreters and interns at the Secretariat, something she enjoys doing and finds particularly rewarding. 

Essi is from Ghana and Togo and currently lives in Brussels, with her husband and their two children.

Her hobbies include cooking, traveling, reading and music.