Ali Bin Gharsan Okaz/Saudi Gazette MAKKAH — The success of this year's "low-cost Haj" project has encouraged the Ministry of Haj to expand the project in the future. The "low-cost Haj" project seeks to provide domestic pilgrims with suitable Haj services at reasonable costs to combat the spiraling costs charged by Haj operators. The manager of the domestic pilgrims affairs at the Ministry of Haj, Fayez Al-Barakati, said that companies offering "low-cost Haj" will be granted additional incentives. Such incentives will include an increase in the number of allocated pilgrims next year, and larger camp areas in the holy sites. This year, 23 companies had participated in offering the low-cost Haj program, which served around 19,000 domestic pilgrims. The ministry has already received 6 applications from new companies for next year. Naser Al-Ahmadi, owner of a domestic pilgrims company, said that the program is an excellent idea, but the Ministry of Haj committed some mistakes this year. The Ministry adopted the program very late in the day, and deprived some companies from offering the program. He believes that companies who are allotted low pilgrims quotas should offer this service. Ahmad Al-Rasheedi, owner of a domestic pilgrims company, said that his company has offered this program during the last three Haj seasons. However, the Ministry of Haj has not kept its promises of allowing extra incentive for such companies, and consequently, he refrained from participating in the program this year. Badr Al-Qurashi, an investor in the Haj sector, said that low-cost Haj is required to defeat the high cost of Haj, however, the program is in need of more considerations to overcome some of its shortcomings. Dr. Abdulaziz Suroohi, the dean of the Custodian of the Holy Mosques Institute for Haj and Umrah Research, said that the expansion of the low-cost Haj program will help in a more organized Haj. It will do away with the squatting phenomena of solo Hajis which create a problem to authorities in organizing Haj. He pointed out that the institute has conducted many studies on the squatting phenomena and that the main reason for this phenomena are the high charges of Haj companies. These studies have recommended a low-cost Haj program, which was adopted by the Ministry of Haj, and has achieved very good results.
