The West African nation Closes Schools and Universities as Jihadist Restrictions Exacerbates Fuel Crisis
The landlocked West African country has suspended educational facilities and universities countrywide due to a critical fuel scarcity caused by a blockade on petroleum supplies enforced by Islamist insurgents.
Top education official announced on national broadcast that all academic facilities would be inactive until November 9th, noting that the movement of personnel and students had been disrupted by the restrictions.
He asserted that the administration were “making every effort” to alleviate the situation so that classes could continue on the tenth of November.
For weeks, Mali has been facing a fuel shortage, notably in the capital Bamako, after insurgents from an al-Qaeda-linked organization initiated a blockade by targeting fuel trucks on primary roads.
The country is landlocked, so all petroleum products are delivered by road from bordering countries such as Senegal and Ivory Coast.
Lengthy waits have been winding around fuel outlets in the main city in the last several days, and the city's normally bustling streets have now reportedly grown silent.
The ruling military council had earlier this month assured citizens that it was only a passing concern, but the emergency has persisted.
In the past few days, the American diplomatic mission in Bamako announced that non-essential diplomatic staff and their dependents would evacuate the country amid the worsening energy crisis and escalating security concerns.
It noted that the energy interruptions had disrupted the power distribution and had the “potential to disrupt” the broader protection environment in unpredictable ways.
The West African nation is now led by a armed forces administration headed by General Goïta, who assumed authority in a takeover in recently.
The junta had popular support when it took power, vowing to tackle the protracted safety emergency triggered by a independence uprising in the northern region by the Tuareg population, which was then co-opted by Islamist militants.
The international UN troops and French forces had been deployed in previously to deal with the increasing militant activity.
Both have withdrawn since the new administration came in, and the current administration has contracted private military contractors to tackle the violence.
Nonetheless, the Islamist rebellion has persisted and extensive regions of the north and east of the nation remain beyond state authority.
