Democratic Forum for Modernity | |
Foundation: | 27 November 1997 |
Ideology: | Liberalism |
Country: | Central African Republic |
President: | Charles Massi |
Headquarters: | Bangui |
Website: | http://www.fodem.org/ |
Secretary General: | Stéphane Pentchoaki |
The Democratic Forum for Modernity (French: Forum Démocratique pour la Modernité, FODEM) is a political party in the Central African Republic.
The party was founded by Charles Massi on 27 November 1997 and legally recognized on 4 May 1998.[1] In the 1998 parliamentary elections it won two seats in the National Assembly. Massi was the party's candidate for the 1999 presidential elections, finishing eighth out of ten candidates with 1.3% of the vote.
In the first round of the presidential elections held on 13 March 2005, Massi won 3.2% of the vote.[2] He backed François Bozizé in the second round[3] and became a Minister of State in the government after the elections.[4] In the simultaneous National Assembly elections, the party was reduced to a single seat.
After Massi was appointed as Political Coordinator of the Union of Democratic Forces for the Rally (UFDR) rebel group,[5] FODEM rejected this move and expelled Massi from the party; it established a provisional political bureau on 22 May 2008 with Joseph Garba Ouangolé as President.[6]
In 2010, FODEM joined the Presidential Majority alliance in preparation for the 2011 general elections.[7] The party nominated six candidates for the 105 seats in the National Assembly,[8] and although the alliance won 11 seats, FODEM failed to win a seat.