BPKH Clarification, Guarantee There Is Not A Single Sen Of The Diputar Hajj Fund For Infrastructure Financing

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JAKARTA - The Hajj Financial Management Agency (BPKH) ensured that no single hajj funds were invested to finance infrastructure projects.

"There is not a penny of direct investment for infrastructure financing, as alleged," said BPKH Executive Board Member Indra Gunawan in Jakarta, Monday, January 30, quoted by Antara.

The management of hajj funds is purely sharia and every placement is consulted with the National Sharia Council of the Indonesian Ulema Council.

Based on the calculation, the deposit funds per member of the congregation were Rp. 25 million and the number of pilgrims was around 5.26 million. Of this total congregational funds of Rp. 132.5 trillion. Meanwhile, the hajj funds managed by BPKH reached Rp. 166 trillion.

"Hajj funds are safe, there are IDR 166 trillion with an exact queue of 5.26 million pilgrims," he said.

He supports the existence of fair and sustainable hajj funds. Sharia law is said to exist to maintain many things, including sustainability in carrying out religious services.

Previously, the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) stated that the Ministry of Religion (Kemenag) and BPKH must be clear and transparent in socializing the cost of Hajj so as not to surprise the public.

"When the Ministry of Religion yesterday announced the plan for ONH (onboard for Hajj) in 2023 worth Rp. 69 million, the public was surprised, because so far it has not been clearly socialized by the community, has it met the overall costs of the pilgrimage," said Deputy Chairperson of the KPK, Nurul Ghufron.

Ghufron revealed that so far the assumption that people's costs for Hajj or ONH, which amounted to Rp35 million to Rp40 million, was the total cost of Hajj, including transportation, accommodation, living expenses, and so on.

Meanwhile, Minister of Religion Yaqut Cholil Qoumas revealed that the cost of Hajj paid by pilgrims was still not sufficient for the real cost of Hajj.

The Ministry of Religion proposes that the average cost of Hajj or Bipih trips in 1444 Hijri/2023 AD is IDR 69,193,733 per person, higher than the cost of Hajj trips in 2022 which is set at IDR 39,886,009 per person.

Yaqut explained that the proposed average cost of Hajj travel covers 70 percent of the proposed average Hajj Implementation Fee (BPIH) of IDR 98,893,909 per person.

"That's why yesterday what we proposed to the DPR this scheme, 70 percent was borne by the congregation, 30 percent of it was used to close using profit funds managed by BPKH," he said.