Mali Suspends Schools and Higher Education Centers as Islamist Militant Restrictions Worsens Petrol Emergency
The landlocked West African country has closed educational facilities and colleges countrywide due to a severe petrol shortage resulting from a embargo on fuel imports enforced by Islamist insurgents.
Top education official announced on state television that all learning centers would stay shut until November 9th, clarifying that the transportation of employees and students had been impacted by the imposed limitations.
He asserted that the government officials were “working tirelessly” to end the emergency so that academic sessions could restart on the tenth of November.
For a number of weeks, Mali has been experiencing a petrol crisis, especially in the administrative center, after militants from an al-Qaeda-linked organization imposed a embargo by attacking transport vehicles on major highways.
Mali is surrounded by land, so all petroleum products are transported by truck from adjacent nations such as Senegal and Ivory Coast.
Long queues have been forming around fuel outlets in the main city in the past few weeks, and the city's typically busy streets have now reportedly grown silent.
The military government had earlier this month promised residents that it was only a short-term problem, but the crisis has continued.
Last week, the United States diplomatic office in the capital declared that secondary diplomatic employees and their families would depart Mali amid the intensifying energy crisis and increasing protection worries.
It explained that the energy interruptions had disrupted the energy availability and had the “potential to disrupt” the general safety conditions in unpredictable ways.
The West African nation is currently ruled by a army council headed by Gen Assimi GoĂŻta, who seized power in a military overthrow in recently.
The military government had widespread approval when it came to authority, committing to deal with the protracted safety emergency caused by a separatist rebellion in the northern territories by ethnic Tuaregs, which was then co-opted by Islamist militants.
The UN peacekeeping mission and France's military had been deployed in 2013 to deal with the increasing militant activity.
The international troops have departed since the new administration came in, and the ruling council has hired private military contractors to tackle the violence.
Nevertheless, the militant uprising has persisted and large parts of the north and east of the country remain outside government control.
