De­fence Min­is­ter Wayne Sturge has again bro­ken his si­lence on is­sues per­tain­ing to his min­istry, ad­dress­ing the leave of two of­fi­cers of the De­fence Force.

In a What­sApp re­sponse to Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day, Sturge re­spond­ed to a news­pa­per ar­ti­cle about his or­ders be­ing de­fied in the mat­ter of leave for Lieu­tenant Com­man­der Daniel Castagne.

Castagne was sched­uled to leave for the US for a naval course last month, un­til June 2026. Sturge, ac­cord­ing to the ar­ti­cle, de­nied his re­quest for leave. How­ev­er, Castagne, de­spite re­port­ed­ly be­ing in­formed of the de­nial, still pro­ceed­ed on leave.

Asked what steps were be­ing tak­en to ad­dress the breach, Sturge said, “This is­sue and the at­ten­dant time­lines are be­ing ver­i­fied.”

The oth­er is­sue was the 605 days va­ca­tion leave grant­ed to Col Ke­ston Charles ear­li­er this month, which was re­scind­ed a day af­ter ir­reg­u­lar­i­ties in his re­place­ment were high­light­ed.

On Au­gust 8, Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Roger Alexan­der was asked about Charles va­ca­tion leave dur­ing a me­dia con­fer­ence and said the mat­ter was be­ing in­ves­ti­gat­ed.

“In­ves­ti­ga­tions are on­go­ing to find out if in fact, it was so or it was not” he said then.

Asked for an up­date about the in­ves­ti­ga­tion, Sturge said, “There is no in­ves­ti­ga­tion. A di­rec­tive was giv­en for an au­dit of out­stand­ing leave of all se­nior of­fi­cers.”