Mali Shuts Down Educational Institutions and Higher Education Centers as Islamist Militant Blockade Worsens Petrol Emergency
The landlocked West African country has temporarily halted educational facilities and colleges across the nation due to a critical petrol shortage resulting from a blockade on energy resources enforced by militant groups.
Top education official stated on national broadcast that all learning centers would remain closed until the ninth of November, noting that the movement of staff and students had been affected by the imposed limitations.
He emphasized that the authorities were “making every effort” to resolve the situation so that classes could continue on November 10th.
For weeks, the nation has been experiencing a energy deficit, especially in the capital Bamako, after armed groups from an al-Qaeda-linked organization imposed a embargo by striking fuel trucks on primary roads.
The country is without coastal access, so all energy resources are transported by road from bordering countries such as Senegal and Ivory Coast.
Extended lines have been snaking around petrol stations in Bamako in the past few weeks, and the city's usually crowded streets have now apparently fallen quiet.
The military government had in recent days promised residents that it was only a passing concern, but the situation has persisted.
Last week, the US Embassy in the capital declared that non-critical embassy personnel and their families would evacuate Mali amid the intensifying energy crisis and growing protection worries.
It noted that the energy interruptions had impacted the energy availability and had the “ability to disturb” the broader protection environment in unpredictable ways.
The West African nation is presently governed by a military junta led by General Goïta, who took control in a takeover in two years ago.
The military government had public backing when it came to authority, vowing to deal with the protracted safety emergency triggered by a independence uprising in the northern region by ethnic Tuaregs, which was then taken over by extremist groups.
The international UN troops and French forces had been deployed in a decade ago to combat the escalating insurgency.
These forces have left since the new administration came in, and the military government has hired Russian mercenaries to address the insecurity.
However, the jihadist insurgency has endured and extensive regions of the northern and eastern territories of the nation remain not under administrative command.