The West African nation Suspends Schools and Universities as Jihadist Restrictions Exacerbates Petrol Shortage
The landlocked West African country has suspended educational facilities and universities across the nation due to a critical petrol shortage triggered by a blockade on fuel imports enforced by Islamist insurgents.
Top education official declared on public media that all academic facilities would remain closed until the ninth of November, clarifying that the transportation of staff and students had been affected by the imposed limitations.
He emphasized that the administration were “working tirelessly” to end the emergency so that classes could restart on the tenth of November.
For several weeks, the nation has been grappling with a fuel shortage, especially in the administrative center, after armed groups from an al-Qaeda-linked organization enforced a embargo by attacking fuel trucks on key routes.
The country is landlocked, so all petroleum products are delivered by road from neighboring states such as Senegal and Côte d'Ivoire.
Long queues have been winding around gas pumps in the main city in the last several days, and the city's typically busy streets have now apparently grown silent.
The junta-led administration had in recent days assured residents that it was only a short-term problem, but the crisis has persisted.
Recently, the United States diplomatic office in the capital stated that secondary diplomatic employees and their relatives would evacuate Mali amid the worsening petrol scarcity and increasing security concerns.
It said that the petroleum supply issues had disrupted the power distribution and had the “capacity to affect” the general safety conditions in unforeseen manners.
The West African nation is presently governed by a armed forces administration under the leadership of Gen Assimi Goïta, who assumed authority in a coup in two years ago.
The military government had public backing when it took power, promising to deal with the protracted safety emergency caused by a separatist rebellion in the north by Tuareg communities, which was then taken over by extremist groups.
The international UN troops and European soldiers had been deployed in a decade ago to address the escalating insurgency.
Both have withdrawn since the military assumed power, and the current administration has contracted foreign fighters to address the violence.
Nevertheless, the Islamist rebellion has continued and significant areas of the northern and eastern territories of the country remain outside government control.
