🔗 Share this article

Mali has closed schools and higher learning institutions throughout the country due to a acute energy crisis caused by a restriction on petroleum supplies imposed by militant groups.

Minister of Education announced on national broadcast that all learning centers would stay shut until the ninth of November, noting that the movement of personnel and pupils had been impacted by the blockade.

He stated that the administration were “making every effort” to resolve the crisis so that classes could resume on 10 November.

For weeks, Mali has been experiencing a energy deficit, notably in the capital Bamako, after insurgents from an al-Qaeda affiliate enforced a restriction by striking fuel trucks on primary roads.

The country is surrounded by land, so all petroleum products are delivered by road from bordering countries such as its western neighbor and Côte d'Ivoire.

Lengthy waits have been snaking around fuel outlets in Bamako in the past few weeks, and the city's typically busy streets have now allegedly become deserted.

The ruling military council had earlier this month reassured residents that it was only a short-term problem, but the situation has persisted.

In the past few days, the United States diplomatic office in Bamako declared that non-critical embassy personnel and their families would leave Mali amid the worsening fuel shortage and growing security concerns.

It noted that the petroleum supply issues had impacted the energy availability and had the “ability to disturb” the overall security situation in unpredictable ways.

Mali is currently ruled by a army council led by Gen Assimi Goïta, who assumed authority in a coup in recently.

The military government had public backing when it took power, promising to address the protracted safety emergency caused by a separatist rebellion in the northern territories by ethnic Tuaregs, which was then hijacked by extremist groups.

The international UN troops and European soldiers had been deployed in 2013 to combat the escalating insurgency.

These forces have left since the military assumed power, and the current administration has hired Russian mercenaries to combat the violence.

Nonetheless, the militant uprising has persisted and significant areas of the northern and eastern territories of the country remain outside government control.