Mali Shuts Down Educational Institutions and Higher Education Centers as Jihadist Restrictions Worsens Fuel Shortage
The landlocked West African country has closed educational facilities and higher learning institutions countrywide due to a acute energy crisis triggered by a embargo on energy resources imposed by militant groups.
Top education official announced on state television that all education institutions would stay shut until 9 November, noting that the movement of staff and learners had been impacted by the blockade.
He emphasized that the administration were “making every effort” to end the crisis so that educational activities could restart on the tenth of November.
For several weeks, Mali has been grappling with a energy deficit, especially in the capital Bamako, after militants from an al-Qaeda affiliate imposed a embargo by attacking transport vehicles on primary roads.
Mali is landlocked, so all petroleum products are brought in by land routes from adjacent nations such as Senegal and Côte d'Ivoire.
Extended lines have been winding around gas pumps in the main city in recent weeks, and the city's normally bustling streets have now allegedly grown silent.
The military government had previously promised the public that it was only a short-term problem, but the emergency has endured.
In the past few days, the US Embassy in Bamako announced that non-essential diplomatic staff and their families would evacuate Mali amid the intensifying petrol scarcity and growing security concerns.
It explained that the petroleum supply issues had impacted the power distribution and had the “capacity to affect” the overall security situation in unforeseen manners.
The West African nation is currently ruled by a armed forces administration under the leadership of Gen Assimi Goïta, who assumed authority in a coup in 2021.
The military government had public backing when it took power, vowing to tackle the long-running security crisis prompted by a independence uprising in the north by Tuareg communities, which was then hijacked by extremist groups.
The UN peacekeeping mission and European soldiers had been deployed in a decade ago to address the growing rebellion.
These forces have departed since the junta took over, and the current administration has contracted foreign fighters to combat the insecurity.
Nonetheless, the militant uprising has continued and extensive regions of the northern and eastern zones of the state remain beyond state authority.
