Secretary Hocine Aït Ahmed Headquarters Algiers, Algeria | President Ali Laskri Political position Centre-left | |
Founded 29 September 1963; 53 years ago (1963-09-29) Ideology Social democracy
Algerianism
Berberism
Laicism | ||
The Socialist Forces Front (Berber: Tirni Iɣallen Inemlayen (RƔN), French: Front des Forces socialistes (FFS), Arabic: جبهة القوى الاشتراكية) is a social democratic and secularist political party, mainly supported by Kabyles in Algeria. The FFS is a member of the Socialist International.
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History and profile
The party was formed by Hocine Ait Ahmed on 29 September 1963 in Tizi-Ouzou to oppose Ben Bella's government. Following the party's creation, a number of towns in Kabylia gave them their support. The Ben Bella government, aided by the Armée de Libération nationale, swiftly took control of the dissident towns during a mostly bloodless confrontation. Preferring to avoid direct conflict, the FFS and its soldiers retracted into the mountains from where they could launch guerrilla tactics.
The party was legalized in 1990. It however boycotted the 2002 and 2007 legislative elections and the 2009 presidential election "calling it systematic electoral fraud in favour of the ruling parties".
2012 legislative election
Though former Prime Minister Sid Ahmed Ghozali urged a boycott on the grounds that the election would be "a foregone conclusion., the party decided to participate in the 2012 legislative election. Apart from international monitors being invited to observe the process, Workers' Party leader Louisa Hanoune, a quite successful candidate to the 2009 presidential elections, had announced to work towards an alliance of the two parties.
Hocine Aït Ahmed wrote to the National Council saying that "participation in these elections is a tactical necessity for the FFS, which falls in line with (its) construction strategy of peaceful democratic alternative to this despotic regime, corrupt and destructive. [The purpose of the party] does not lie in a quota of seats to reach [but] in mobilising political[ly] and peaceful[ly] in our party and our people." With an electoral result of mere 2.47% the party reached 27 seats making it the second-largest opposition power after the Islamist Green Algeria Alliance.