I must follow awards speeches, initially in mother tongue (5)
I believe the answer is:
masai
'tongue' is the definition.
(Masai is an example)
'i must follow awards speeches initially in mother' is the wordplay.
'must follow' says to put letters next to each other.
'initially' suggests taking the first letters.
'in' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'mother' becomes 'ma' (ma can mean mother).
The initial letters of 'awards speeches' is 'as'.
'as' going within 'ma' is 'masa'.
'i' after 'masa' is 'MASAI'.
(Other definitions for masai that I've seen before include "East African people" , "E.African pastoral people" , "Member of an African pastoral people" , "Africans" , "Well-known tribe of Eastern Africa" .)