Demobilization – 1995
1995
The process of encamping former rebels in cantonment sites started in November 1995. The Malian government could not find a donor to fund the cantonment process, and only had encouragement from the UNDP. The initiation of the cantonment process was financially challenging because the cantonment dossier reported that the Ministry of the Armed forces and the Veterans had figures of 9,000 potential candidates for demobilization. This would cost the government about five billion CFA Francs. However, a mission was established to find the candidates for demobilization from armed movements and it found that fewer than 2,000 persons were potential candidates. The ministry subsequently estimated that as many as 3,000 combatants were to be demobilized for a cost of about 900 million CFA Francs.1 The cantonment process started on 15 November 1995.