Former German president walks off stage when asked to deliver speech in English at Turkey event

Former German President Christian Wulff walked off the stage where he was due to deliver a speech at the Turkish Business Foundation Conference, after he was informed on stage that he will have to speak English instead of his native German as there was no German interpreter present at the event.

Wulff was among the speakers at the conference titled ‘’Understanding China, Doing Businesses with China’’ organized by TUSIAD in Istanbul.

He first got up on the podium to deliver his speech but when he began to speak in German, a woman got on stage and asked him to speak in English instead of German as there was no German interpreter present at the event.

The baffled former president said: “Excuse me but it is not possible for me to speak in English at this moment.”

“My head of office said German-Turkish translation service would be provided here. So then, I propose to make discussion between discussion members without me and I wish I would attend this conference next year and speak with translator/interpreter in German-Turkish,” Wulff can be heard saying in a video outtake of the incident.

After his brief explanation, Wulff thanked the audience and got off the podium.