Saudi Gazette report JEDDAH – Minister of Haj Dr. Bandar Hajjar announced Wednesday that strict punitive measures will be taken against expatriates who perform Haj without a valid permit effective from next Haj season. “These measures might include deportation of violators and ban on them from re-entering the Kingdom for 10 years,” he said. Dr. Hajjar also unveiled the Ministry's move to implement a strategic plan for Haj and Umrah for the next 25 years. “A technical expert committee has been constituted by an order from Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah to prepare the strategy plan last year. The committee is making finishing touches to the plan and it will be made public in the near future,” he said, noting that the plan is being drafted after taking into account of the growing number of Haj and Umrah pilgrims every year and the limited space at the holy sites, the Saudi Press Agency reported.
The minister made the remarks while addressing a meeting on “Improving Haj and Umrah services” at King Abdulaziz University. Reiterating the Kingdom's keenness to extend the best possible services and facilities to pilgrims, Dr. Hajjar said: “This is our duty as contained in the Kingdom's basic governing law and stipulated as the second goal of the 7th Development Plan.” He noted that the Kingdom considers serving the Guests of Allah as an honor and hence it is striving to make the services as perfect as possible. “The government of Saudi Arabia is not levying any fee for visas or for the services extended to pilgrims. The charges paid by Haj and Umrah pilgrims go either to the private sector or to the tawafa organizations for services related to housing, transportation and food,” he said. The minister cited the ongoing largest-ever expansion in the history of the two holy mosques as the best example of the government's keenness in lavishly spending to ensure the best services and facilities for pilgrims.
He described the limited space of Mina as one of the major challenges facing the government in serving pilgrims. “The tent city of Mina covers a total area of 1.45 million square meters and this means that a pilgrim will have 2.6 meter space. In the event of a high influx of pilgrims because of people without a permit, each pilgrim could get 1.8 meter space only,” he said, announcing plans to impose strict restrictions for illegal pilgrims from the next Haj onwards. “As for the space set aside for domestic pilgrims, it can accommodate only 230,000. A study is underway with regard to fixing charges to be levied from domestic pilgrims for each category of services.” With regard to plans for next Haj, Dr. Hajjar said that pilgrims would have access to all the services available to them well before their arrival to the Kingdom with the introduction of the e-tracking system this year. Pilgrims can also do their finger printing at their respective countries and this will further ease the immigration procedures at King Abdulaziz International Airport. The minister also spoke about the plan to restructure the tawafa organizations. “An expert panel is studying the plan at present, and it will be implemented after getting approval from the King. The plan aims at separating ownership and administration of these bodies, making their administration in a business manner and addressing lingering problems related to their administration and inheritance that date back to 70 years,” he said, noting that these bodies receive SR500 per pilgrim and this price was fixed nearly 50 years ago in 1385H and henceforth no changes have been made. Dr. Hajjar said women are also allowed to engage in Haj services and tawafa work provided that it should be within the framework of Shariah regulations. The minister appreciated the steps taken to put an end to Umrah visa violations. “A total of 5.5 million pilgrims performed Umrah last year, of which the overstayers were only 8000. The Kingdom is receiving about 400,000 Umrah performers every month and this figure would peak to 800,000 in Ramadan,” he added.
