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The landlocked West African country has suspended educational facilities and universities throughout the country due to a severe petrol shortage caused by a restriction on fuel imports implemented by militant groups.

Minister of Education declared on state television that all education institutions would be inactive until the ninth of November, clarifying that the transportation of personnel and students had been affected by the blockade.

He stated that the authorities were “doing everything possible” to alleviate the emergency so that educational activities could restart on the tenth of November.

For a number of weeks, Mali has been experiencing a fuel shortage, especially in the capital Bamako, after insurgents from an jihadist network enforced a embargo by targeting transport vehicles on key routes.

The country is surrounded by land, so all petroleum products are transported by truck from neighboring states such as its western neighbor and Côte d'Ivoire.

Long queues have been snaking around gas pumps in Bamako in the last several days, and the city's normally bustling streets have now reportedly fallen quiet.

The military government had previously promised citizens that it was only a short-term problem, but the emergency has persisted.

Recently, the United States diplomatic office in the capital declared that non-essential diplomatic staff and their families would leave the country amid the worsening petrol scarcity and increasing safety issues.

It noted that the energy interruptions had affected the power distribution and had the “ability to disturb” the general safety conditions in unpredictable ways.

The West African nation is now led by a armed forces administration under the leadership of Gen Assimi Goïta, who took control in a takeover in 2021.

The military government had public backing when it assumed control, committing to address the protracted safety emergency triggered by a independence uprising in the northern region by Tuareg communities, which was then hijacked by jihadist fighters.

The international UN troops and French forces had been deployed in previously to deal with the escalating insurgency.

Both have departed since the military assumed power, and the ruling council has hired private military contractors to tackle the violence.

Nevertheless, the Islamist rebellion has persisted and extensive regions of the northern and eastern zones of the nation remain beyond state authority.