Mali Suspends Schools and Universities as Jihadist Blockade Intensifies Petrol Shortage
Mali has closed educational facilities and universities countrywide due to a critical fuel scarcity triggered by a embargo on fuel imports imposed by militant groups.
Top education official declared on state television that all academic facilities would be inactive until 9 November, explaining that the travel of staff and students had been affected by the blockade.
He stated that the authorities were “working tirelessly” to alleviate the situation so that classes could restart on the tenth of November.
For several weeks, the nation has been experiencing a fuel shortage, especially in the administrative center, after armed groups from an al-Qaeda affiliate imposed a blockade by striking transport vehicles on key routes.
Mali is without coastal access, so all energy resources are delivered by truck from neighboring states such as Senegal and the neighboring nation.
Lengthy waits have been snaking around gas pumps in the main city in the past few weeks, and the city's normally bustling streets have now apparently grown silent.
The ruling military council had earlier this month promised residents that it was only a short-term problem, but the crisis has endured.
Last week, the US Embassy in Bamako announced that non-critical embassy personnel and their relatives would depart Mali amid the deteriorating energy crisis and growing safety issues.
It said that the energy interruptions had affected the power distribution and had the “ability to disturb” the general safety conditions in unforeseen manners.
The West African nation is currently ruled by a army council led by General Goïta, who assumed authority in a takeover in recently.
The junta had public backing when it took power, vowing to tackle the long-running security crisis triggered by a independence uprising in the northern territories by ethnic Tuaregs, which was then co-opted by extremist groups.
The United Nations stabilization force and European soldiers had been stationed in previously to combat the growing rebellion.
Both have departed since the junta took over, and the current administration has contracted foreign fighters to address the violence.
Nevertheless, the jihadist insurgency has endured and extensive regions of the north and east of the nation remain beyond state authority.
