By Ishola Balogun
The Chairman, National Hajj Commission of Nigeria, NAHCON, Barrister Abdullahi Muktar Muhammad has said that the early closure of pilgrims registration by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, hindered more pilgrim registration in the country.

He disclosed that only 55,000 Nigerian pilgrims registered would be performing this year’s Hajj exercise.

Barrister Muhammad made this known during an interactive session with journalists in Abuja Saturday. It could be recalled that Saudi authorities has earlier allocated 95,000 Hajj seats to Nigeria for the 2018 Hajj exercise.

The reduction in the registration of the Nigerian Intending pilgrims for the 2018 Hajj exercise, according to the NAHCON Chairman, was attributed to the early closure of pilgrims registration by the Saudi authorities.

“The early afternoon closure by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was due to the Saudi authority’s plan to know the exact number of pilgrims all over the world that would perform this year’s Hajj exercise. “Majority of Nigerian pilgrims according to history, register for Hajj at least a week before the commencement of the core Hajj exercise.

“If the Commission continues to register intending pilgrims up to the last flight in the mid of August this year, the Commission would register about 20,000 additional Intending pilgrims. But the window of that last week registration is no longer available.“

He explained that most of the traders and other average businessmen turn around their monies and wait for the last week to pay, pointing out that, the last week window is however no longer available