Kaduna Agency Goes For Automated Hajj Operations

Kaduna State Pilgrims Welfare Agency has commenced the automation of its pilgrims’ operations.

It covers registration, payment, processes, rituals and other associated activities until the pilgrims return to Nigeria.

The agency said the automation plan would begin with an e-accommodation system, through which state’s pilgrims would know their abodes in Saudi Arabia before arriving in the holy land.

The agency’s executive secretary, Dr. Yakubu Yusuf Arrigasiyyu, who disclosed this when he presented the reviewed training manual, said the agency, under the automation plan, would deploy digital technologies such as e-commerce, blockchain, and QR codes in processing Kaduna pilgrims.

According to him, with the launch of the reviewed manual, “Pilgrim trainers will soon be invited to reapply for training offers. The aim is to elicit the best pilgrim trainers who will be retrained in line with the current realities in order for them to instill the needed education more effectively.

“The agency will begin to incentivise the trainers to encourage them to do well. Similar action is being taken on the Jerusalem Pilgrimage side. A sensitisation workshop has been conducted with Pastors and work is being done to promote Jerusalem pilgrimage to make it robust and thriving.”

“The agency has just concluded a capacity enhancement training for its staff ahead of this Hajj Savings Scheme and Jerusalem pilgrimage coming later this month,” he said.

On the automation efforts, Arrigasiyyu said, “Work is being done to modernize pilgrim operations in Kaduna State. We intend to fully automate the entire pilgrims’ operations from registrations, payments, processes, rituals and everything until the pilgrim returns  to Kaduna.

“Digital technologies like e-commerce, blockchain, QR codes will be used in processing Kaduna Pilgrims from this year until it reaches maturity by 2024. This year, we Insha Allah are going to experiment with our e-accommodation system by which our pilgrims should know their abodes in Saudi Arabia even before they leave.

“Also, in its drive towards the self-sustaining Pilgrims welfare agency target of the Mallam Nasiru Elrufai administration, the agency has gone far in organising umrah tour operations, the first of its kind to be embarked by any Pilgrims agency in the country.

“By the 15th and 17th of Ramadan 2023, the Agency will operate umrah return flights to Medina. This will help boost religious tourism in Kaduna and aid the business of travelling agencies operating in the state,” he said.

Some of the religious leaders who spoke at the event, commended the agency’s efforts towards the provision of a unified manual to guide Hajj pilgrimage for pilgrims of Nigeria and urge other states of the country to emulate Kaduna on the development