Clerics and Imams ask for clarifications about Ministry’s move to foster “religious tourism”

Clerics and Imams of several Zaouias or Koranic schools in Algeria have called on the Religious Affairs end Endowments Minister, Mohamed Aissa, to provide clarifications about the agreement recently concluded last week with the Tourism Ministry on the launching in the country of a so-called “religious tourism” and its development and to expound the ins and outs of this religious-oriented project.

They urged the minister to explain thoroughly the objective and the scope of this “religious tourism” project to be jointly fostered by the religious affairs and tourism ministries as part of the relevant accord for fear of seeing certain frequented places to be turned into haunts for heresies, drifts and misguidance.

As a matter of fact, the Ministry of Religious Affairs’ move, through the inking of this agreement with the Tourism ministry, ostensibly encouraging religious tourism, sparked off great controversy among puzzled senior clerics and religious scholars, who did not understand the exact meaning of “religious tourism”, saying they even ignore the most appropriate places to be visited by the citizens and even foreigners as part of this planned endeavour.

In a reaction, they branded the accord as “murky” and urged, as a result, the Minister of Religious Affairs and Endowments to bring ample clarifications on the matter.