Chaos surrounds historic Makkah’s Ja’ranah Mosque

Chaos surrounds historic Makkah’s Ja’ranah Mosque

February 28, 2017
Street vendors occupy the roads leading to the mosque and toilets without the slightest sense of responsibility for their uncivilized behavior. — Okaz photo
Street vendors occupy the roads leading to the mosque and toilets without the slightest sense of responsibility for their uncivilized behavior. — Okaz photo


MAKKAH – Umrah visitors from different nationalities come to the historical mosque Ja’ranah because of its closeness to the bus station, but they find nothing there that makes them happy. The mosque has become a place for displaying the goods of street vendors, thus distorting the historical image of the sacred place.

Mansour Al-Mqati, Mohsen Al-Hudhali, and Nawaf Bin Muheisen Al-Otaibi called for intensification of field inspections by competent authorities such as the municipality to prevent this phenomenon, which paints a picture of an uncivilized Makkah for Muslims. They pointed out that street vendors sleep on the ground and corridors leading to the mosque and toilets without the slightest sense of responsibility for their uncivilized behavior. “The mosque is visited by many pilgrims since the beginning of the Umrah season until the pilgrimage season. Sale operations must be organized there both through small stalls in areas surrounding the mosque or by allocating a place in one of the corners to display their goods, rather than in random and chaotic manner,” they said.

Director of Public Relations and Media in the municipality Osama Zaytuni said the municipality was keen to achieve a higher level of environmental sanitation and remove everything that could be a danger to public health and elimination of all random phenomena and violations to prevent unhygienic conditions posing a threat to public health. He pointed to the existence of supervisory field trips of the General Directorate of Environmental Health Subcommittee, municipalities and some of the security authorities and the competent departments to combat illegal vendors which is a source of environmental pollution.

“There are ongoing field trips of the locations and the merchandise of small vendors is continuously confiscated and destroyed on the spot. The focus is on sites having a large number of street vendors surrounding markets, mosques and other sites,” he said. And more often than not, he added, street vendors are violators of labor and residency laws.


February 28, 2017
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