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Mali has suspended educational facilities and colleges throughout the country due to a critical energy crisis triggered by a blockade on energy resources enforced by jihadist fighters.

The Education Minister declared on national broadcast that all academic facilities would remain closed until 9 November, noting that the travel of employees and learners had been disrupted by the imposed limitations.

He emphasized that the authorities were “making every effort” to alleviate the emergency so that academic sessions could continue on the tenth of November.

For a number of weeks, the nation has been facing a fuel shortage, especially in the main city, after militants from an al-Qaeda affiliate initiated a embargo by targeting transport vehicles on primary roads.

The country is landlocked, so all energy resources are transported by truck from adjacent nations such as its western neighbor and the neighboring nation.

Extended lines have been winding around fuel outlets in Bamako in the past few weeks, and the city's usually crowded streets have now allegedly grown silent.

The military government had in recent days assured citizens that it was only a short-term problem, but the crisis has persisted.

Recently, the US Embassy in Bamako declared that secondary diplomatic employees and their relatives would leave Mali amid the worsening energy crisis and growing security concerns.

It said that the fuel disruptions had impacted the energy availability and had the “ability to disturb” the general safety conditions in unforeseen manners.

The West African nation is presently governed by a military junta under the leadership of General Goïta, who assumed authority in a military overthrow in 2021.

The junta had widespread approval when it assumed control, promising to deal with the ongoing instability triggered by a autonomy movement in the northern region by Tuareg communities, which was then taken over by Islamist militants.

The United Nations stabilization force and European soldiers had been sent in a decade ago to address the escalating insurgency.

These forces have departed since the junta took over, and the ruling council has contracted private military contractors to combat the violence.

Nevertheless, the jihadist insurgency has continued and extensive regions of the north and east of the state remain outside government control.