Shorter stay suggested for pilgrims

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The Ministry of Religious Affairs should provide more flights for Indonesian pilgrims to Saudi Arabia because shorter hajs would be cheaper, meaning more people could go, two haj groups say.

A haj travel agency and guide group said on Friday most pilgrims stayed for long periods in Saudi Arabia because there was a lack of flights between there and Indonesia.

Indonesia, the most populous Muslim country, has the largest quota of haj pilgrims allowed to enter Saudi Arabia, with around 200,000 people annually.

"Their stay is long because there is an inadequate number of flights to carry such a huge number of pilgrims," Sueb Soleh, who manages haj guidance organization Wakah Madani, said.

Indonesians stay for an average 40 days during the pilgrimage, compared to their Singaporean counterparts who spend only 26 days.

Syafrizal, of the Maktour haj agency, said hiring more planes could reduce pilgrims' average stay to about two weeks, which would cut their expenses.

There is normally only about one flight a day to and from Indonesia.

The Indonesian government set the haj fees for the recent pilgrimage at Rp 27 million (US$2,930).

An official of the ministry, Budi Haryono, said that even if the ministry increased the number of flights, the length of stay could not be reduced dramatically.

He said the lengthy stay was inevitable because of the large number of Indonesians that had to be managed compared with the far smaller numbers of Malaysian and Singaporean pilgrims.

Only about 30,000 Malaysian and 4,500 Singaporean pilgrims performed the ritual this year.

The ministry was improving its services in order to slash the period of stay to 33 days, he said.

Critics have demanded that the government privatize the haj management. (006)