The National Hajj Commission of Nigeria (NAHCON) has blamed the Saudi Arabian Government for the commission’s inability to give accurate account of Nigerian casualties in the 2015 Hajj stampede.
Dr Saleh Okenwa, Commissioner Planning, Research Statistic Information and Library Service (PRSILS) of the commission, stated this at a news conference, Monday in Abuja.
Okenwa expressed the determination of the commission to continue to work with relevant stakeholders to account for the remaining pilgrims that died in the stampede.
He, however, confirmed the death of 274 Nigerian pilgrims; 44 still missing, while two were still receiving treatment in a Saudi hospital.
“The number of Nigerians confirmed dead in the stampede is 274; those injured and on admission in Jeddah are two, while 44 remain officially declared missing.
“This was a year that the Saudi Arabia government did their best to ensure the success of Hajj exercise and safety of pilgrims, but Allah decreed that this will happen.”
He said that the Saudi Arabian Government was yet to respond to Nigeria’s request to be part of its committee set up to probe the incident.
“Nigeria requested to be part of the committee investigating the incident, but we are yet to receive response from the Saudi authority.”
Earlier, the Chairman of NAHCON, Alhaji Abdullahi Mohammed, said that it was the prerogative of the Saudi Government to decide the composition of the committee investigating the stampede.
He, however, said that Nigeria had yet to receive any compensation pledge by Saudi Arabia for the victims of the September 11 crane crash at the precinct of Ka’aba (the Grand Holy Mosque in Mecca).
On his part, the Head of NAHCON medical team, Dr Ibrahim Kana, said effort was being made to find the 44 missing Nigerians using the DNA samples of their family members.
He added that the sample would be collected and sent to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, for cross matching of the 44 missing Nigerians.
The 2015 Hajj witnessed a crane accident which occurred at Saudi Grand Mosque on Friday, September 11 and a stampede which occurred nearly a fortnight later on Thursday, September 24.
According to the Okenwa, the two tragic incidents witnessed during the pilgrimage occurred despite efforts by both Saudi authorities and Nigerian Hajj officials to make the exercise hitch-free.
He said the tragic incidents should be accepted as the will of Almighty God, praying that Allah would “accept the victims of the tragedies as martyrs and grant their families and loved ones the fortitude to bear the loss”.
Okenwa said that the commission has been working since the occurrence of the stampede to get all relevant and accurate information regarding the details of the Nigerian victims, adding that the commission constituted several committees charged with the responsibility of handling issues arising from the Hajj tragedies.
Okenwa further said, “In cases where the corpses were mutilated, fingerprint analysis matching with entry data in the Saudi Immigration Service” were used in identifying the victims.
He added, “In extreme cases where the bodies were mutilated beyond fingerprint analysis, direct relatives of the victims who also came for Hajj were required to provide blood samples in the hospital”.
The NAHCON commissioner added that dead victims were buried in numbered graves, adding that despite all the efforts made, there were cases where the bodies were unidentifiable and relatives of the victims were not available in the kingdom (of Saudi Arabia) for DNA provision. In such cases, the dead bodies were buried on the directives of the Saudi authorities, in line with avoidance of health hazards to the living.
Concerning missing pilgrims who could not be confirmed dead because there was no certified evidence of their identities, he said, “Nigeria recorded 44 of such cases, hence the need for DNA of the relatives of the missing pilgrims”.
He, however, explained that this situation is not peculiar to Nigeria alone as many other countries had their own share of the tragedies in various degrees.
