Forum for Democratic Change
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Forum for Democratic Change
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| Leader | Mugisha Muntu |
| Secretary | Nathan Nandala Mafabi |
| Founded | 2004 |
| Political position | Centre-right |
| International affiliation | International Democratic Union |
| National Assembly of Uganda |
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| Website | |
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The Forum for Democratic Change (FDC), founded on 16 December 2004, is the main opposition party in Uganda. The FDC was founded as an umbrella body called Reform Agenda, mostly for disenchanted former members and followers of President Yoweri Museveni's National Resistance Movement (NRM). Party president Kizza Besigye, formerly a close ally of Museveni, was a presidential candidate in the 2001, 2006, and 2011 presidential elections. In November 2012, Mugisha Muntu was elected as President of the FDC. His five-year term of office runs until after the presidential and general elections slated for early 2016.
FDC was the greatest challenge to the NRM in the 2006 presidential and parliamentary elections. Besigye was the party's presidential candidate, taking 37 percent of the vote against Museveni's 59 percent. Besigye alleged fraud and rejected the result.
In the general election of 23 February 2006, the party won 37 out of 289 elected seats. In the presidential election on the same date, Besigye won 37.4 percent of the vote. In the 2011 election, the party performed worse with Besigye getting 26.01 percent of the vote and the party winning 34 seats.
The origins of the FDC are intertwined with the history of the ruling NRM led by President Museveni. The NRM through its military wing the National Resistance Army (NRA) fought a successful guerrilla war against the governments of Milton Obote and Tito Okello and came to power in Uganda in 1986. During the guerrilla war, Museveni successfully moulded various interest groups into an effective military machine, and on achieving power, he began to build the NRM into a cohesive political organisation. The transition process and the NRM's desire to broaden its political base revealed other interests within the party and a feeling amongst some senior members of being sidelined.
Museveni had relied heavily on the support of the Tutsi refugees and their descendants who had been forced out of Rwanda by the Hutu majority in the 1960s. During the guerrilla war, the NRA had moved from the central district of Luwero to the west of the country where most of the Tutsis had been recruited. On achieving power, Tutsis like Paul Kagame and Fred Gisa Rwigyema were rewarded with powerful positions within the army and government.
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Wikipedia