Hajj: NAHCON counts losses as pilgrims return

According to the National Hajj Commission, no fewer than 310 pilgrims didn’t come back with the contingent as a result of the September tragedies that befell the 2015 pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia.
The commission confirmed that 99 Nigerians died, 215 are missing while 42 got injured. The state pilgrim welfare boards had 73 casualties, while tour operators had 26.
NAHCON Commissioner for Planning, Research, Statistic Information and Library Service, Dr. Saleh Okenwa, stated this in an interview with journalists on Thursday in Makkah, Saudi Arabia.
Of those injured, Okenwa said 41 are from the state pilgrim boards, and one from a tour operator. “The numbers of those missing from the states were 96 males, 94 females and four males who were officials, totaling 194, while 10 males and 10 females were missing from the tour operators.”
He noted seven of the injured are still Saudi hospitals while others have been discharged.
The Sokoto delegates were particularly hit with stampede that claimed about 700 lives of pilgrims in Makkah, and injured over one million others.
Many of the pilgrims blamed the Saudi government for poor security, particularly in crowd control when the pilgrim were observing the stone-the-Devil ritual September 24.