The Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA), has called on President Muhammadu Buhari to constitute an independent investigative commission to probe the allegations that security operatives collude with bandits as raised by Kaduna-based Islamic scholar, Sheikh Ahmed Gumi.

HURIWA made the call in reaction to Gumi’s claims that the Nigeria Police Force, and the Army were colluding with bandits.

The rights group urged the NPF and the Nigerian Army to investigate probe the allegations.

The Nigerian Army, however, denied the allegation, while warning Gumi against making such claims.

But the Kaduna-based cleric insisted that some bad eggs in the security system were aiding banditry with weapons and drugs.

Reacting to the allegation, the HURIWA said the security agencies should “cover their faces in unmitigated shame for their shameless cowardice and pampering of the Kaduna Islamic cleric Ahmed Gumi, who continues to defend terrorists and flouting with reckless abandon, the Nation’s anti-terrorism law which prohibits aiding and abetting of terrorists.”

In a statement by its National Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, and the National Director of Press, Miss Zainab Yusuf, HURIWA dismissed as puerile, infantile, irrational illogical and cowardly, the official responses to the damaging allegations made by Gumi by the Army and police about the unholy communion between security forces and the terrorists terrorizing the whole of North-West carrying out a rash of kidnappings and killings.

Stressing that there are no smokes without fire, HURIWA said, “Whereas Sheikh Gumi has consistently accused the security forces of working with the terrorists, neither the Federal Government nor the security forces have instituted legal action against the prominent Kaduna based Islamic cleric who is credited by even the National Security Adviser of having unfettered access to the terrorists in the North-West of Nigeria.

“With his acclaimed access to the terrorists, is it not conceivably possible that he has some intelligence alluding to a possible unholy alliance between security forces and the terrorists?

“This clear display of unprofessionalism and cowardice by both the Army and police shows that after all, these allegations that the security forces work with terrorists deserves the most forensic and independent investigations.

“Dismissing these allegations with a mere wave of hands as have been done by the police and Army is totally unacceptable.”

The rights group then compared the tepid reactions of Army and police to Gumi’s “very elaborate accusations to the childish cries of the ‘Chihuahua pet dog.’

HURIWA said it does not make any sense that a person with considerable knowledge about the workings of terrorists in the North-West otherwise called armed bandits by the government has made such a major damaging claim of criminal collusion between security forces that ought to protect the territorial integrity of Nigeria and terrorists threatening national security, and the best response we can get are the childish cries from Army spokesman and the police.

“This is a crying shame,” HURIWA insists.