Former Defence Minister Dominic Nitiwul has sharply criticized President John Dramani Mahama over the prolonged absence of a substantive Defence Minister, warning that Ghana’s security architecture is being exposed amid rising regional threats.

Speaking on the floor of Parliament on Wednesday, he said the recent terrorist attack on Ghanaian tomato traders in Burkina Faso that killed eight highlights the urgent need for focused leadership at the Defence Ministry.

He argued that the cross-border nature and scale of the attack require a fully mandated Defence Minister to coordinate investigations, intelligence, 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.

He stressed that the Defence Minister, rather than the Interior Minister, should have led the response:

“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 explained.

Mr Nitiwul warned that leaving the Defence Ministry without a substantive occupant risks weakening intelligence coordination and undermining Ghana’s preparedness at a time of heightened regional instability.