Jakarta. Indonesia is sending 229,000 pilgrims to perform the hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia's holy city of Mecca this year.  This makes the largest Hajj quota Indonesia has ever received to date.

The quota also already includes the government-managed “regular” pilgrims, “special pilgrims” or those who go to Mecca using travel agency services, as well as the pilgrim officers.

“The Saudi Arabian government initially granted us a quota of 221,000 pilgrims. But they later added 8,000 spots so that brings [Indonesia’s] quota to 229,000 people,” the Indonesian Ambassador to Saudi Arabia Abdul Aziz Ahmad said in Medina, as reported on Thursday by Beritasatu.

Indonesia sent 100,051 hajj pilgrims last year. No Indonesian flew to Mecca for hajj in 2020-2021 due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Indonesia’s annual quota in 2017-2019 was capped at 221,000 pilgrims. Back in 2016, the hajj quota for the Muslim-majority country stood at 168,800 people. 

The Saudi Arabian deputy minister for hajj affairs Mohammed Abdurrahman Al-Bijawi said that his country would do its best to serve the Indonesian hajj pilgrims. “Such as by slashing the immigration tracks,” he said.

The quota system is in place to make sure that the hajj season runs smoothly. 

Other countries’ hajj quotas this year are far lower than that of Indonesia. Close neighbor Malaysia is sending 31,600 people to Mecca for hajj, while Kuwait gets a quota of 8,000 pilgrims. Saudi Arabia allows Bangladesh to send 127,000 people to perform the hajj. The official quota for Kyrgyzstan is 6,000, while Palestine can send 6,600 pilgrims.