President Prabowo Subianto, on Monday (09/28) received a report from the Minister and Vice Minister of Hajj and Umrah at the Presidential Palace Complex in Jakarta. During the meeting, the Head of State put a lot of concern to the effort of Ministry of Hajj and Umrah in shortening the waiting time for Indonesian Hajj pilgrims.
Vice Minister of Hajj and Umrah Dahnil Anzar Simanjuntak said that President Prabowo fully supports various measures carried out by his ministry to cut the pilgrims’ waiting period. The President continues to push the ministry to find a formula to shorten the waiting time.
“The President said that he fully supports the Hajj Ministry’s efforts to shorten the waiting time and continues to push the ministry to seek a formula for it. It’s important for you to note that since the Hajj Ministry has been established, the longest waiting time was 49 years. The President then ordered to seek a solution to shorten it,” Dahnil told the media after the meeting.
Following up on this directive, the Government then changed the calculation formula for the waiting time. Dahnil said this measure temporarily reduced the Indonesia’s average waiting time for Hajj pilgrims to 26 years. However, the President still considered this waiting time too long and asked for further improvement.
“Alhamdulilah, last year we changed the formula to shorten the Indonesia’s average waiting period into 26 years, yet the President said that it was still too long,” Dahnil said.
The Ministry of Hajj and Umrah then performed data cleaning and validation over 5.7 million Hajj pilgrims. It turns out that the ministry has identified approximately 400,000 invalid data items.
“The Minister, I, and the entire team at the Hajj Ministry cleaned up and validated the existing data of 5.7 million Hajj pilgrims, and we found 400,000 invalid data,” he added.
After the validation process and factual calculations were done, Dahnil said that hajj pilgrims departing this year had an average waiting period of 14 years. This figure is shorter than the previous queue calculation.
“So, from 49 to 26 years, the Hajj waiting period is now 14 years, as the President’s order to find a formula and clear up the 400,000 invalid data,” Dahnil concluded.
The Government will continue to improve Hajj data and governance so that prospective pilgrims receive more accurate information on waiting periods and greater certainty of departure. (BPMI of Presidential Secretariat) (JAS/MMB)
