The funeral of the representative of the General Caliph of the Tidjania Brotherhood in Sudan, Sheikh Allal Ben Hmida, who died on March 30th, at the age of 77, took place on Friday at the cemetery of the Kourdane Palace, in Aïn Madhi (70km west of Laghouat).
The body of the deceased was transported on Friday morning on board a military plane that landed at Laghouat airport and was received by the advisor of the President of the Republic, in charge of Zawiya and Religious Associations, Aissa Belakhdar, accompanied by the governor of Laghouat, Abdelkader El Baradeï, as well as sheikhs and sponsors of the Tidjaniya order.
The General Caliph of the Tidjaniya Brotherhood, Sheikh Ali Belarbi Tidjani, said in a statement to the press that Algeria, Sudan, and the entire Arab and Islamic nation, with the death of Sidi Allal, son of Sidi Hmida, “Has lost a great scholar and a distinguished Sheikh who contributed to the call to Islam and peace throughout his life, during which he moved between many African countries while carrying out his duties as the representative of the Tidjaniya order and speaking on its behalf”.
Sheikh Belarbi also thanked the President of the Republic, Mr. Abdelmadjid Tebboune, and the People’s National Army which ensured the allocation of a military plane that transported the body of the deceased from Khartoum Airport to Moulay Ahmed Medeghri Airport, in Laghouat.
The body of the late Sheikh Allal Ben Hmida was also accompanied by two delegations from Sudan and Chad, led by the representative of the Sudanese government, Muhammad al-Amîn al-Shanqîtî, who, upon the arrival of the plane at Laghouat airport, offered his sincere condolences to the Algerian and Sudanese peoples on the death of the representative of the General Caliph of the Tidjaniya Brotherhood, in the State of Sudan.
Muhammad al-Amîn al-Shanqîtî praised the late Allal Ben Hamida’s qualities, his great role in bringing peace to the Darfur region, and his tireless efforts to reconcile between the Sudanese brothers during every crisis that the country was exposed to.
He also considered the allocation of a private plane and the organization of official funeral ceremonies in both Sudan and Algeria, “the biggest evidence” of the importance of the Tidjaniya zawiya for the presidents of the two countries.
It is worth mentioning that the deceased was one of the grandchildren of the founder of the Tidjaniya order, Sidi Ahmed Tidjani, and was entrusted with the task of the personal representative of the general caliph of the Tidjaniya order in the state of Mauritania in 1997, where he lived for 4 years before he occupied the same capacity in the state of Sudan from 2001 until he passed away.
