Former Defence Minister Dominic Nitiwul has criticised President John Dramani Mahama over the continued absence of a substantive Defence Minister, warning that the situation risks weakening Ghana’s security architecture at a time of rising regional threats.
Speaking on the floor of Parliament on Wednesday, Mr. Nitiwul referenced the recent terrorist attack on Ghanaian tomato traders in Burkina Faso, which left eight people dead, as evidence of the urgent need for focused leadership at the Defence Ministry.He argued that the cross-border nature and scale of the attack required a fully mandated Defence Minister to coordinate investigations, intelligence gathering and a decisive national response.
“I just think that the Ghanaian government must be explaining to us what happened, the circumstances. I think the government has not yet come out. They’ve come out officially with some statement, but we want a detailed explanation either by the Foreign Minister or by the Defence Minister,” he said. Mr Nitiwul maintained that the Defence Minister—rather than the Interior Minister—should have led the response to the incident.
“That’s why I kept on calling for the President to appoint a Defence Minister, because by this time the Minister for Defence should have been on the flight to Burkina with his team. This is not the job of the Interior Minister… the Interior Minister’s job ends at Paga on the border.
“It doesn’t go beyond the border. It’s the duty of the Minister for Defence, with defence intelligence and national security, to have gone there, set up a team, investigate, and ensure that they find out the circumstances that led to it and how to prevent it from happening again,” he added.
Mr Nitiwul warned that leaving the Defence Ministry without a substantive occupant could weaken intelligence coordination and undermine Ghana’s preparedness amid growing instability in parts of the West African sub-region.
The government has yet to respond directly to his remarks.
Source: Myjoyonline.com
