🔗 Share this article

The landlocked West African country has temporarily halted educational facilities and colleges countrywide due to a severe fuel scarcity resulting from a embargo on fuel imports enforced by Islamist insurgents.

Minister of Education declared on national broadcast that all education institutions would be inactive until the ninth of November, noting that the transportation of employees and students had been affected by the restrictions.

He emphasized that the administration were “doing everything possible” to resolve the situation so that classes could restart on the tenth of November.

For several weeks, the nation has been grappling with a energy deficit, notably in the administrative center, after armed groups from an jihadist network initiated a embargo by targeting fuel trucks on key routes.

Mali is surrounded by land, so all fuel supplies are delivered by land routes from neighboring states such as its western neighbor and the neighboring nation.

Lengthy waits have been snaking around petrol stations in the main city in the past few weeks, and the city's normally bustling streets have now reportedly fallen quiet.

The junta-led administration had earlier this month promised residents that it was only a short-term problem, but the crisis has persisted.

Last week, the American diplomatic mission in Bamako stated that non-essential diplomatic staff and their dependents would depart the country amid the worsening petrol scarcity and increasing safety issues.

It noted that the fuel disruptions had affected the power distribution and had the “ability to disturb” the overall security situation in unexpected forms.

The West African nation is now led by a military junta under the leadership of Gen Assimi Goïta, who took control in a coup in 2021.

The military government had public backing when it took power, committing to deal with the protracted safety emergency caused by a separatist rebellion in the northern region by Tuareg communities, which was then co-opted by Islamist militants.

The United Nations stabilization force and European soldiers had been deployed in a decade ago to address the escalating insurgency.

The international troops have departed since the junta took over, and the military government has hired private military contractors to address the instability.

However, the Islamist rebellion has persisted and large parts of the north and east of the nation remain beyond state authority.