With less than 81 days away from the commencement of the airlift of Nigeria pilgrims to Saudi Arabia for the 2023 haj exercise, the Chairman of the National Hajj Commission of Nigeria NAHCON Alhaji Zikirullah Kunle Hassan said called on all Nigerians wishing to travel for this year’s Hajj to finalise payment of their deposits on or before March 7, because registration will soon close.
Alhaji Zikirullah Kunle Hassan made the call during the inaugurated committees that will handle Aviation matters during the fourth coming to Hajj 2023 operations. The committees inaugurated are the airline screening committee and the Aviation monitoring committee.
The committee were chaired by the Commissioner in charge of operations at NAHCON, Alhaji Magaji Hardawa and the commission’s head of Aviation, Engr. Mohammed Goni respectively was inaugurated at Hajj House Abuja on Wednesday by the chairman of NAHCON, Alhaji Zikirullah Kunle Hassan.
“All Nigerians wishing to travel for this year’s Hajj to finalise payment of their deposits on or before March 7, because registration will soon close”
“By our plan, the inaugural flight will take place on May 21 this year, which is 81 days away, so the screening committee should work day and night and have a report ready for the transition to Mr President for Approval by March 7,” the chairman said.
Alhaji Hassan admonished the two committees to ensure that all issues regarding the choice of Airlines, aircraft and Airports to be used are done in good time.
Speaking earlier, the commissioner in charge of operations, Alhaji Hardawa stated that this is the first time that the current NAHCON board is undertaking a bid application opening g exercise because there was no Hajj in 2019 and 2020 due to the advent of Corona Virus and there was also no time to do it ahead Hajj 2022.
“Airlift is an important component of Hajj operations, if we fail to get it right, chances are higher that it will impact negatively on the entire Hajj operations,” he said.
He stated that the Air Carriers’ screening committee will ensure that only those Airlines that meet the requirements put in place are considered for ferrying Nigerian pilgrims.
