Nigerian officials are desperately seeking the release of up to 1,000 Muslim women held in a Saudi airport jail for traveling without approved chaperones.
The women, some of whom have been held since Sunday, had been enroute to make the Muslim Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca.
Nigeria's ambassador to Saudi Arabia told the BBC the authorities were stopping women under the age of 35.
Diplomats pressed into service from Abuja were stumped by the development as there had been an understanding in the past that Nigerian women were exempt from travelling with a male relative - a requirement for women on the Hajj.
A longstanding agreement between National Hajj Commission of Nigeria and the Saudi authorities allows visas to be issued for Nigerian women going to Mecca as long as they are accompanied by their local Hajj committee officials.
But since Sunday, hundreds of Nigerian women have been stopped at the airports in Jeddah and Medina.
Nigeria's ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Abubakar Shehu Bunu, said he made a formal protest to the foreign affairs office in the capital, Riyadh, today, Wednesday.
"They are stopping women particularly between the ages of 25 and 35 without a male relative. Those over 45 are not a concern to the Saudi authorities," he told the BBC's Hausa Service.
One woman told the BBC her group were being held in Jeddah not because they were travelling without male relatives but because the surnames on their passports did not correspond with those of their husbands.
"Our husbands' names are different from our surnames and they won't allow that," Bilkisu Nasidi, who travelled from the northern Nigerian city of Katsina, told the BBC's Focus on Africa program.
She said the hundreds of women were sleeping on the floor, did not have their belongings and were sharing four toilets at the King Abdulaziz International Airport in Jeddah.
It is a common practice for Muslim women in Nigeria not to take their husband's name.
More than two million Muslims are due to converge on Mecca for this year's Hajj, which is set to culminate over a four-day period somewhere between October 24-29 depending on lunar observations.
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We Africans are nothing to anybody. We worship their 'God' as an imported religion (like Christianity) and that gives us a racial inferiority complex as our modern Gods are not in our image and likeness and so deep down in our subconciuos we accept that we are of a lower human race. There are resons why Jesus is presented with that look. We truly need a Pan African movement that is reborn and powerful
ReplyDeleteAya! so pathetic...
ReplyDeleteWhy won't they give them back there belongings? They should have mercy on them na!
ReplyDeleteIt serve dem right, why wont they bear theies spouses' names? D same mecca dat teaches dem 2 refuse dear husbands' names is d 1 frustratin dem oho o!
ReplyDeleteThere is need for the nigerian authourity to look into their problms soonest.
ReplyDeleteHope they would be opportuned to perform the pilgrimage.
The best measure to take is to excempt the youths at the ages 25-35 years and allow those fourty and above to perform the pilgrimage.
Pls christian moronic people dont put ur bacality idiot mouth about dat useless people better qt pls
ReplyDeleteI seriously pity these religious victims, but all I know is that, God is everywhere. Peace.
ReplyDeleteWhy do foreign countries maltreat Nigerians? I feel it is a wake up call for our Govt to fight this injustice immediately. If not, we should retaliate and let them feel it too.
ReplyDeleteAbeg, we don't give a damn about them. The less the number of muslims. The better since u ppl love death, why not kill them all for defilomg the holy land?
ReplyDeleteWat ar d plans of d boko haram to dz effect?i hope dey ar planning to attack or ar d oda moslem faithfuls planning dia protest.pple wtout work d devil alwayz b providing u wt 1.
ReplyDelete25 - 35 years.Hmmmmmmm... runs, runs, runs. Secret don leak. Dem dey claim to be going for pilgrimage but na runs... How far now? We know all this things.. Abeg mek we talk another thing joor.
ReplyDeleteTrue true my bro, na so so runs all those ladys are going there to do, breez don blow we don see chiken yansh.
ReplyDeleteThis is definitely not nigeruas fault. Saudi Arabia is a damn mean country!!
ReplyDelete