The Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) has called on the hierarchy of the Department of State Services (DSS) to stop the incessant harassment of Christian clerics in the country.

HURIWA advised the secret Police to, rather, adhere strictly to their duties of preventing terrorists from succeeding in the large-scale carnage and violence against the citizenry.

HURIWA was reacting against the backdrop of reported invitations for questioning of the Director of Adoration Ministry, Enugu, Reverend Father Camilus Ejike Mbaka, and the Catholic Bishop of Sokoto Diocese, Rt. Reverend Dr. Mathew Hassan Kukah, by the DSS.

The group explained that while Bishop Kukah was reportedly being invited over his Christmas Day Sermon in which he carpeted the Federal government for going it soft with kidnappers, terrorists and armed bandits in the North of Nigeria, Rev. Fr Ejike Mbaka, on his part, was quoted to have disclosed that his prayers for the detained leader of the now proscribed Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB), Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, was responsible for the anonymous invitation he received from the DSS.

However, HURIWA, in a statement by its National Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, and National Director of Media, Miss Zainab Yusuf, faulted the DSS, describing the invitations issued to the two clerics as “unpatriotic, unconstitutional and illegal.”

The group noted that the invitations smack of religious intolerance and a sign that the DSS was being manipulated by the powers-that-be in Abuja.

The rights group accused the DSS of being deployed “as attack dogs against only Christian leaders, especially those who raise their voices against the heightened state of insecurity in Nigeria;” alleging that the DSS “has consistently looked the other way when provocative, hate-filled speeches are made by notable Moslem CLERICS against Christians particularly.”

“HURIWA is scandalised that the respected Cleric Bishop Matthew Kukah, who leads the Sokoto Catholic Diocese in Nigeria’s northwestern zone, released a Christmas message in which he said the government, led by President Muhammadu Buhari, seems to have left the fate of Nigerians in the hands of “evil men," and this innocuous but truthful statement from a Servant of God is being viewed as a threat against the interest of the cabal running government in Abuja.

“It is a sacred and undeniable truth encompassed in the well articulated Christmas Speech in which His Eminence, Bishop Kukah, decried the fact that over 100 girls abducted by the Islamic terrorist group Boko Haram have yet to be found, as well as “hundreds of other children whose captures were less dramatic.

“We condemn this aggression against the Church and against the Body of Christ by the current federal government. This harassment must stop unless this government does not mean well for Nigeria,” the group said.

“Why the morbid fear for the truth? Is it not true that hundreds of women of Katsina, Zamfara and Sokoto States are being raped by terrorists and yet not one of these violent rapists are ever charged for these crimes against humanity? Is it not true that thousands of people are being kidnapped, killed, maimed, humiliated, raped, all around Nigeria and the government seemed overwhelmed to take steps to bring this situation of anarchy and doom to an end? Is it not true that terrorists are on rampage all over Nigeria and the government which loaded the headship of all key security institutions with people from a section of the country have failed to arrest these mass killers waging campaigns of genocides and land grabbing war of attrition?” HURIWA queried.

HURIWA also carpeted the DSS for its continuous harassment of the Enugu State based Catholic Priest, Rev. Fr. Mbaka who reportedly stated that he has just got an invitation after he publicly prayed for Mazi Nnamdi Kanu.

It recalled that a leaked video of Sheik Gumi addressing a gathering recently circulated on social media. Similarly, the group pointed out that a Kaduna-based Islamic cleric, Uztaz Abubakar Salihu, had threatened to kill Christians in Nigeria if the Muslims were attacked again.

HURIWA noted that in a viral video, the Islamic cleric threatened to kill Christians in retaliation to the murder of 25 Fulani travellers who were intercepted and killed recently by suspected Irigwe militia in Jos, the Plateau State capital.

According to the statement, “HURIWA condemns the DSS for looking away from inviting the aforementioned Islamic Clerics who made incendiary statements and openly threatened Christians, but the DSS is persistently harassing Christians such as Bishop Kukah, Fr Mbaka, Pastor Suleiman; but even when Gumi incited terrorists against Christian Soldiers, he was never invited.

“HURIWA has therefore urged the DSS to be patriotic and to stop using the instrumentality of their office and their positions today to intimidate and harass Christians.”

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