Ezekiel Awojide, Abuja
The National Hajj Commission of Nigeria held a meeting with State Muslim Pilgrims’ Welfare Board Executive Secretaries under the Forum of States in Abuja on Tuesday to assess the level of preparedness of the State Pilgrims’ Boards.
It was agreed at the meeting that the 2025 inaugural flight should be held on May 9.
In his opening speech at the meeting, NAHCON Chairman, Prof. Abdullah Usman, called on the states to update NAHCON on the level each state has reached in Visa production, vaccination, bag procurement, and other sundry matters.
During the meeting, Commissioner Operations, Prince Anofiu Elegushi disclosed that Air Peace has been assigned 5,128 pilgrims cumulative from Abia, Akwa Ibom, Anambra, Armed Forces, Bayelsa, Benue, Borno, Cross River Delta, Ebonyi, Edo, Ekiti, Enugu, Imo, Kogi, Ondo, Rivers, and Taraba states.
FlyNas, on the other hand, was allocated 12,506 pilgrims from the Federal Capital Territory (FCT Abuja), Kebbi, Lagos, Ogun, Osun, Sokoto, and Zamfara states. FlyNas is bringing in nine aircraft for the operation.
Max Air is airlifting pilgrims from Bauchi, Gombe, Jigawa, Kano, Katsina, Kwara, Oyo, and Plateau states.
The airline promised to conclude the airlift of its 15,203 maximum by May 24. Two aircraft will be deployed for the operation- a B747 with 400 capacity and a second aircraft with a 560 capacity.
Umza has been allocated 10,163 pilgrims from Kaduna, Adamawa, Nasarawa, Niger and Yobe states. Umza is deploying two aircraft a B747 with 477 capacity and a B777 with 310 capacity.
The 2025 Hajj airlift distribution was calculated on a total of 43,000 pilgrims.
The Commissioner Planning Research Statistics Information & Library Services, Prof Abubakar Yagawal, informed the house of the level of the Commission’s preparedness in terms of clinics secured in Makkah and Madinah, distribution of Yellow Cards to states and finally reminded them not to enroll pregnant women for the Hajj exercise.
The meeting was further deliberated and settled on the 9th of May as the date of the inaugural flight to be concluded by May 24.
The inbound flight was tentatively scheduled to commence from June 13 to end by July 2.
