Mali has closed educational facilities and higher learning institutions throughout the country due to a severe petrol shortage caused by a restriction on energy resources enforced by Islamist insurgents.
The Education Minister stated on public media that all academic facilities would stay shut until the ninth of November, noting that the travel of staff and pupils had been affected by the blockade.
He emphasized that the authorities were “making every effort” to alleviate the situation so that academic sessions could restart on the tenth of November.
For a number of weeks, Mali has been facing a fuel shortage, particularly in the capital Bamako, after militants from an al-Qaeda-linked organization initiated a embargo by attacking tankers on key routes.
Mali is without coastal access, so all petroleum products are transported by road from adjacent nations such as Senegal and the neighboring nation.
Extended lines have been forming around fuel outlets in Bamako in the last several days, and the city's usually crowded streets have now allegedly grown silent.
The junta-led administration had in recent days assured the public that it was only a temporary issue, but the crisis has persisted.
In the past few days, the US Embassy in the capital declared that non-critical embassy personnel and their relatives would evacuate the country amid the intensifying energy crisis and escalating security concerns.
It explained that the energy interruptions had impacted the energy availability and had the “ability to disturb” the broader protection environment in unforeseen manners.
The West African nation is now led by a armed forces administration headed by the military leader, who assumed authority in a takeover in two years ago.
The military government had widespread approval when it assumed control, vowing to tackle the long-running security crisis caused by a separatist rebellion in the northern region by the Tuareg population, which was then hijacked by Islamist militants.
The international UN troops and European soldiers had been sent in 2013 to combat the growing rebellion.
Both have left since the military assumed power, and the ruling council has hired Russian mercenaries to tackle the insecurity.
Nonetheless, the Islamist rebellion has continued and large parts of the northern and eastern zones of the country remain outside government control.
