National Hajj Committee refunds fares of pilgrims

5/2/11

Story: Musah Yahaya Jafaru
THE National Hajj Committee (NHC) has refunded Hajj fares to 150 of the 356 pilgrims who could not perform last year’s Hajj.
The payment were made through the various Hajj agents as and when the pilgrims made the demand for a refund.
Meanwhile, some of the pilgrims have decided to keep their money with the NHC as their Hajj fares for this year’s Hajj.
The Chairman of the NHC, Alhaji Alhasan Bene, told the Daily Graphic that the NHC was still refunding the Hajj fares to the pilgrims.
Therefore, he said, any fully-paid pilgrim who wanted a refund of his money could make the request.
However, he said, the pilgrims who did not want a refund would be among the early flights for Hajj 2011 and any increase in Hajj 2011 fares would not affect them.
In a related development, the NHC and the Ghana Hajj Agents Association (GHAA) have reached a consensus on a way forward for this year’s Hajj after a meeting.
One of the key agreements was the selection of one more member of the GHAA to serve on the NHC, and thus bring their number to two on the committee.
They also agreed to start receiving payments of this year’s Hajj fares, which would be the same as last year’s of 3,100 for the time being.
The meeting decided to stop receiving Hajj fares two months before the first departure in October.
Alhaji Bene described the outcome of the meeting as fruitful, which would go a long way in ensuring a problem-free Hajj this year.
He said the NHC would request the extension of Ghana’s quota of last year from 2,500 to 3,500.
That, he said, was to cater for the increasing number of Ghanaian pilgrims and those who could not make it last year.
Alhaji Bene said upon the peaceful resolution of the court case by a creditor of the defunct Interim Hajj Management Committee of Hajj 2008, the NHC authorised its bankers to pay the creditor $151,000 and GH¢2,000 as per out-of-court agreement.
An Executive Member of the GHAA, Alhaji Garba Ibrahim, said the Hajj agents had decided to support the NHC to improve the organisation of this year’s Hajj.
He said the Hajj agents were satisfied with the decisions taken so far, especially the inclusion of another Hajj agent on the NHC.
Alhaji Garba who is the Managing Director of Al-Balad Travel and Tours Limited, said the NHC had refunded the Hajj fares of some of the pilgrims who could not perform last year’s Hajj, and indicated that some of them had decided not to take the refund but rather use it as their fare for this year.