The Department of State Services (DSS) under the leadership of Alhaji Lawal Musa Daura has been tasked “to halt ongoing psychological and physical persecution and torture of Christian leaders.”

The Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) made the request via a statement signed by the National Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, and National Media Affairs Director, Miss Zainab Yusuf. The statement issued on Friday in Abuja condemned as “selective persecution and harassment, the recent interrogation of the national leadership of the Christian Association of Nigeria over a global campaign to attract funds to rebuild churches destroyed by Boko Haram terrorists in North East.”

HURIWA said there was absolutely nothing untoward for Christian leaders to canvass for genuine funding support to carry out evangelism, “including the rebuilding of Churches destroyed by Islamic terror group of Boko Haram, particularly when Christianity is a Universal Religion just like the Islamic Religion.”

The rights group said the action of DSS amounts to profiling of Christian leaders only because of their religious status even as it dismissed the action as “absolutely discriminatory and therefore unlawful and unconstitutional.”

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