Indonesian Congregants Are Still Prohibited To Do Umrah By Saudi Arabia, MPR Urges Government To Lobby Immediately

JAKARTA - Deputy Chairperson of the MPR RI Syarief Hasan asked the government to carry out intensive communication and lobbying with the Government of Saudi Arabia to grant Umrah permits for pilgrims from Indonesia.

According to Syarief, this needs to be done, because until now the Government of Saudi Arabia has not allowed pilgrims from Indonesia to perform Umrah.

"Policies like this should be communicated with the Saudis, so that Indonesian pilgrims can return to worship and perform Umrah at the Grand Mosque," said Syarief Hasan in his statement in Jakarta, Antara, Sunday, October 3.

Syarief's statement quoted data from the Saudi Gazette that the Ministry of Hajj and Umrah of Saudi Arabia announced that the capacity of pilgrims who were allowed to perform Umrah and pray at the Grand Mosque had increased. From the original 70 thousand to 100 thousand per day.

However, Indonesian pilgrims have not yet received any permission to worship at the Grand Mosque. The Consul General of the Republic of Indonesia in Jeddah said that pilgrims from Indonesia had not been allowed to perform Umrah and worship at the Grand Mosque until now.

Syarief assessed that Saudi Arabia would highly consider Indonesia's position as the country with the largest Muslim population in the world.

In addition, according to him, Indonesia also has an interest because it is a country with the largest Muslim population in the world, so the Indonesian government must continue to lobby intensively.

"The Indonesian government must be able to convince by showing data that so far Indonesia has been able to significantly reduce the number of COVID-19 transmissions. The data is shown to the Saudi government, so that it becomes a reinforcement so that pilgrims from Indonesia get permission to perform Umrah," he said.

In addition, he admitted that he was surprised by the COVID-19 data in Indonesia that Government data showed that it had succeeded in reducing COVID-19 cases. However, according to him, there are still many countries including Saudi Arabia who do not believe it, as evidenced by not giving permission for Umrah.

"This is because even though the death data has decreased, tracing and testing have also decreased, so we must push for more tests to be increased until there are no more COVID-19 cases and the death rate can be suppressed," he said.