THE media have already been awash with the news that some licensed tour operators have dumped the slots allocated to them by the National Hajj Commission of Nigeria (NAHCON) and withdrew from further participation in the 2025 Hajj processes. However, we were forced to set the record straight, because from the reports we have read so far, there were sinister attempts aimed at twisting the narrative to turn us against our colleagues and members with whom we sweat day and night to ensure they got a better deal and a more acceptable bargain for their teeming and innocent Pilgrims.
WHO ARE WE?
To start with, it is important to define the people involved in this saga, before we are portrayed as commoners and bystanders in the Hajj and Umrah business. The three companies are represented by CEOs with a combined post graduate experience of over ninety years from both the public and private sectors. We have been in and around the Hajj and Umrah industry for more than sixty years combined. In fact, the CEO of Positive Trends Travel and Tours has been in the industry throughout his career. Therefore, the decision we took to withdraw from the 2025 Hajj operation was not accidental but rather out of a conscious resolve to protest against what we believe is a gang-up of self-servicing individuals around the Hajj management system, that over the years have continued to deceive the government that employ or appointed them and the general public about the actual happenings in the industry.
They continue to block and resist any genuine and dissenting voice aiming to bring forth and enlighten the public about the true cost of Hajj, about the rights and privileges of the pilgrims and above all the why over the years our pilgrims suffer from poor services at the Masha’eer, as if suffering is a cardinal pillar of the Hajj rites. Apart from our individual impeccable credentials as CEOs of our companies we are also officials and representatives of tour operators under the banner of the Association for Hajj and Umrah Operators of Nigeria (AHUON), which remains the only true trade association with the mandate to represent Nigeria’s Hajj and Umrah tour operators. Our positions:
a. Ikramah Muhammad – Deputy President (Hajj Affairs)
b. Ambursa A. Usman – Vice President (Abuja zone)
c. Haruna Isma’il – Vice President (Kano zone)
We appreciate the privilege of the mandate we enjoyed under the later cap, which we have worn for some years now and used to steadfastly fight against the injustices being perpetrated at NAHCON. However, for the purpose of this release we have chosen to rely on the rights we have as Nigerians and as licensed tour operators to speak out for posterity and for our colleagues in the industry to understand that, in the word of legendry civil right activist and leader, Martin Luther King, Jr.: “Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.” —Martin Luther King, Jr.
We took this path knowing fully that it’s going to be a thorny and knotty adventure, because of the many vested interests involved in the Hajj debacle in the country. Everybody wants to get entangled with Hajj affairs in Nigeria, invariably because of the huge amount of money that is circulated in the Hajj operation, but nobody is interested in asking the simple questions; where does the money come from? Are those monies actually spent for the critical needs of the Pilgrims? What are those critical needs? Who are responsible for the provision of such critical services? How are those services being costed or estimated? How open is NAHCON in providing information about the services and cost of the Hajj fares to Nigerians? These are some important questions we intend to avail Nigerians with their answers in these three parts releases. Nevertheless, we intend to focus more on the activities of the international Pilgrims where we are directly involved, without prejudice to the general suffering of conventional Pilgrims who suffer more because of the two-factor authentication regime they go through (NAHCON and State Pilgrims Welfare Boards and agencies) in their spiritual journey.
HISTORY OF THE STRUGGLE
One of the cardinal objectives of AHUON is to co-ordinate and rationalize the activities of Hajj & Umrah tour operators and cooperate with government agencies and parastatals in respect of the Hajj & Umrah operations; to reduce the hardship of Muslim Pilgrims and strengthen their image in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The last and current executives of the Association have shown determination to uphold and promote these objectives from the year 2022 to date. It started during the regime of Barr. Zikirullahi Kunle Hassan at NAHCON, where we set our priorities, among which was the privilege we sought to be allowed to select service providers that will provide Hajj services to our Pilgrims. What are these Hajj services? They include: provision of tents, catering and transportation services between Muna, Arafat and Muzdalifah for the 4 or 5 days of the Hajj rites.
Our argument for this demand was very simple. We noticed over the years that our Pilgrims are being maltreated and offered substandard and inhumane services across the Masha’ir experience and at the end of every Hajj we suffer the backlash in terms of abuses, lost credibility and litigations. Innocently, we are never parties to the service providers’ selections or the services negotiation, which of course includes the pricing, quality, quantity and timing of the services offering. Where is justice in this arrangement. NAHCON does not have a single Pilgrim. We have! NAHCON doesn’t know the demands, needs and tastes of our Pilgrims. We know! Then, how could NAHCON continue to decide for the fates of our clients? NAHCON as a regulator has no legal basis to create a package and sell to Pilgrims by proxy, and we dare challenge the Commission to prove these powers in the NAHCON Act. After the shamble experience of the 2023 Hajj, the Barr. Zikrullah-led board agreed in principle to heed to our demands in the 2024 Hajj. As God willed it, they were not opportune to superintend the Hajj.
Then enters the board of Barr. Jalaluddeen Arabi: An experience bureaucrat that came with the earnestness to put the Hajj house in order, but ended up worse than his predecessors. Barr. Arabi supported and encouraged our demands after reviewing past happenings. However, after a meticulous search and negotiation and coming up with far better and transparent offers than what NAHCON negotiated during his tenure, he denied us the opportunity openly and enforced a minority (about 10%) opinion upon an overwhelming majority decision (almost 90%). We still call that verdict “the Arabi’s Justice”. As if Barr. Arabi hasn’t done his worst, the current regime led by Prof. Abdullahi Saleh Usman is poised at ensuring not only that our demands are never granted, but bent on destroying the Association and make sure that it become comatose and indolent. While Barr. Arabi was bureaucratically monocratic. Prof. Saleh choose to be Machiavellian in his approach.
WHY IS NAHCON AFRAID OF CEDING SERVICE CONTRACTS NEGOTIATION TO THE OPERATORS?
Before we narrate the story of the injustice, greed and sheer dishonorable decisions of the Prof. Saleh board, that led to our withdrawal from the current Hajj activities, let’s pause and ask; as simple and licit as our demands are, why is NAHCON averse to allowing us the freedom to negotiate and select our service providers? These are some of the questionable points that beg for reflection:
a. Nigeria has 95,000 Pilgrims’ allocation from the Saudi ministry of Hajj and with the liberalization of the service provision elements, any service provider wanted to have romance with the Country. NAHCON is so greedy that it can’t let go, the 20,000 (tour operators’ allocation) because of the favors it enjoys from the competing service providers. The total number is so intimidating and attracted several suitors who are ready to do any bidding in order to win patronage from NAHCON. It is in the public domain that gift items, high profile contacts, hotel rooms offers and other untold favors goes around by prospective service providers each time a new season is open. You can ask, why should a NAHCON chairman leave his illustrious office in Makkah and went around to recruiting for service providers. It is not only demeaning to the country, but questions the integrity of the Commission.
b. Unlike what is popularly known in Nigeria where civil servants inflate contracts with the intent to defraud government or the public treasury, in the case of NAHCON they “deflate” the contract ironically. NAHCON signs contracts publicly and charges the innocent Pilgrims based on the amounts signed, however, it goes back and negotiates a lower service offering or accept same downgrade from the provider for a cut. We have the figures of what was negotiated last year and we know what we were asked to pay. But who pays the price? Same Pilgrim that NAHCON was established to protect is the one that bears the final brunt!
c. Apart from the scenario described above, only God Almighty knows the number of underground dealings taking place between NAHCON officials and some of these service providers. This includes commissions and after service returns for executed transactions. In fairness to some service providers, they are intimidated or cajoled to play along or they will bear the consequence in future operations. This practice is more obscure in situations where the services are being sub-contracted especially catering, which in some instance goes two layers down the ladder to the final caterer who provide the services. We saw recently how everybody turns out to be a caterer, accommodation provider and all other things you can think about including facilitators, in order to get a share of the Hajj cake. NAHCON has turn itself into a market place selling accommodation, brokering catering services and even selling tent A to VIP buyers.
d. NAHCON will never allow transparent and open negotiation of Hajj services by a second body like AHUON (not willingly) because they know we know the components and that will amount to uncovering their secrets of many years. What happened this year alone is enough exposition that is seen only by those with discerning minds. We are very proud with what we achieved so far, and the struggle is already yielding positive results. The Hajj services fees announced this year is less expensive by over N500,000 (Five Hundred Thousand Naira) than last year, this is because the Commission is aware that the tour operators are coming up with cheaper and more transparent deals, therefore, giving no room to inflate the fees. But what about “deflation”? We shall wait and see.
e. NAHCON is ready to deal with anybody who dare challenges its authority to regulate and operate at the same time like it has happily dealt with us through cowing, vindictiveness and falsification. Many of the tour operators that are participating in the Hajj 2025 are doing so out of fear of persecution and the repercussion of not being obedient, not out of conviction that things are going in the right direction. We choose to be different not because we want to make name, but to prove the point that the foundation of a credible liberty starts with disobedience, as rightly put by the American philosopher and poet, Henry David Thoreau: “Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty. The obedient must be slaves.” —Henry David Thoreau.
We choose not to be slaves to any civil servant or political appointee especially in the wake of gross constitutional violation and trampling of the rights and privileges of innocent citizens that labored very hard to fulfil a life-long dream of spiritual cleansing. We are business men and women of integrity and believe the current regime of His Excellency Bola Ahmed Tinubu as regards the free-market economic policies are supposed to promote private ingenuity and entrepreneurship in all facets of the economy, including Hajj management. Therefore, the government should compel NAHCON to hands-off anything to do with operation and allow open and transparent processes that will usher in competition, right pricing and best services to the Nigerian Pilgrims.
THE NEXT RELEASE
As indicated above, we shall address the many ignominious decisions taken by the current NAHCON board led by Prof. Saleh Usman and why we feel honored to throw in the towel. We shall also answer all the questions raised above on the cost of Hajj in Nigeria and how the common Pilgrim is been compelled to pay for the recklessness of government officials. For those that are interested in figure as to the Naira, Riyals and Dollars involved should catch-up to our second and third releases. However, as a responsible government we wish to call on the President and Commander-in-Chief of the Nigerian Armed Forces to show interest in what is happening in NAHCON and be pro-active in the midst of what is glaringly a failed project.
Thank you.
USMAN A. AMBURSA
Travel Express Ltd, Abuja
08033138590
HARUNA ISMA’IL
An-Noor Air Services and Tours Ltd, Kano
08060000190
IKRIMAH MUHAMMAD
Positive Trends Travel and Tours Ltd, Kaduna
08039650646