Saudi Arabia has just cancelled this year’s annual hajj. President Buhari should follow suit and place a five year moratorium on all pilgrimages

Ayo Akinfe

(1) Yesterday, Saudi Arabia announced that foreign pilgrims will not be allowed to make the annual hajj pilgrimage this year due to coronavirus fears. Basically, they adhered to Plato’s theory of “The chief good,” subordinating their religious and economic interests to the greater good of mankind

(2) Annually, Saudi Arabia generates $12bn from the hajj pilgrimage but the country has decided to cut her losses. It is economic madness to earn $12bn and then spend $15bn fighting a subsequent epidemic that could also decimate your population to the point whereby you can no longer function economically

(3) Nigerian Muslims are not any more pious than those in Saudi Arabia, so if they can forgo the annual pilgrimage to Mecca and Medina, so too can we. If Allah understands their plight, surely he will also be reasonable when it comes to Nigeria and appreciate the fact that the annual hajj is something we simply cannot afford as a nation

(4) About 1% of Nigeria’s annual budget is spent subsidising religious pilgrimages. This is money badly needed to fund infrastructural development like schools, roads, railways, hospitals, libraries, etc. President Buhari should be brave and suspend all pilgrimages until Nigeria’s GDP totals at least $1trn

(5) To make up for any loss local Muslims feel, Nigeria should develop the tomb of Sheikh Usman Dan Fodio into a religious shrine and tourist attraction. I challenge anyone to explain to me why prayers said at the Kaaba are more holy than those which shall be offered at Dan Fodio’s tomb in Sokoto

(6) State governments that want to should also be encouraged to build alternative smaller Islamic pilgrimage sites at the tombs of other prominent Nigerian Muslims. Possible candidates include Mohammed El-Kanemi, Sheikh Abubakar Gumi, Sir Ahmadu Bello and Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa

(7) Our goal should be to reverse the pilgrimage capital flight and turn the hajj from a cash drain into a cash gain. Nigeria should set herself the target of generating at least $5bn a year from Muslim pilgrimages. For starters, let us try to capture the African market

(8) We can enter into a regional agreement with our neighbours, offering pilgrims a West African pilgrimage package that involves visits to the tombs of the likes of Mansa Musa, Mari Jata, Idris Alooma, Ibn Batuta, etc. Imagine having a rail link that takes you from Dan Fodio’s tomb in Sokoto to the Grand Mosque in Timbuktu within two hours in an air conditioned high speed train

(9) Given that he has nothing to lose and is not seeking anything any more, President Buhari can afford to tell Nigerians the bitter truth. Religious pilgrimages are simply a luxury we can no longer afford and are a drain on scarce foreign exchange. That is a reality we simply have to face as a people no matter how unpalatable it sounds

(10) Over the longer term, Nigerians have to ask themselves why they cannot indigenise their religious faiths. Turn them into revenue generators to better the lives of their children, grand children and generations of unborn Nigerians. At the moment, religion is a self-indulgent act about individuals selfishly wanting to go to heaven and enjoy the luxuries of eternal life and paradise. Our economy simply cannot sustain that manner of thinking. Elsewhere, people have a way of eschewing orthodoxy and converting everything to their domestic advantage. We have to learn to do likewise too!