Ghana's President John Dramani Mahama has asked Finance Minister Cassiel Ato Forson to also act as defence minister after a military helicopter crash in which the defence minister was among those killed,

The helicopter had taken off from Accra, the capital, en route to a mining conference when it went “off the radar,” the armed forces said.

The government of Ghana says that military helicopter has crashed and killed all eight people aboard including the country’s defense and environmental ministers