MRND

The National Republican Movement for Democracy and Development (Mouvement républicain national pour la démocratie et le développement) was the ruling political party of Rwanda from 1975 to 1994 under President Juvénal Habyarimana. Between 1975 and 1991, when it was known as the National Revolutionary Movement for Development (French: Mouvement Révolutionaire National pour le Développement, MRND), the MRND was the only legal political party in the country. It was dominated by Hutus, particularly from President Juvenal Habyarimana's home region of Northern Rwanda. The elite group of MRND party members who were known to have influence on the President and his wife Agathe Habyarimana are known as the akazu.

Following the Rwandan Genocide in 1994, the MRND was banned.

Background
The party was established by Habyarimana on 5 July 1975, exactly two years after he had ousted the first post-independence president Grégoire Kayibanda in a coup d'état. Habyarimana established a totalitarian state and banned the Parmehutu party, which had been dominated by Hutus from southern Rwanda. The MRND succeeded the Parmehutu in its position of the dominant state party. A new constitution was approved in a 1978 referendum, making the country a one-party state in which every citizen was automatically considered to be a member of the MRND.

Presidential elections were held in 1978 with Habyarimana as the sole candidate. He was re-elected with 99% of the vote. Parliamentary elections followed in 1981, with two MRND candidates contesting each of the 64 seats. Habyarimana was re-elected again in 1983 and 1988, whilst parliamentary elections were held under the same system in 1983 (with the National Assembly enlarged to 70 seats) and 1988.

The party's name was changed after the legalisation of opposition parties in 1991. The youth wing of the party, the Interahamwe, later developed into a militia group that played a key role in the Rwandan Genocide. After Habyarimana's death in April 1994, hardline elements of the party were among the chief architects of the genocide; the Coalition for the Defence of the Republic (CDR), which played a significant role, was originally a hard-line Hutu Power faction of the MRND that became a separate party.

After Rwanda was conquered by the rival Tutsi-dominated Rwandan Patriotic Front led by Paul Kagame, both the MRND and the CDR were driven from power and banned in July 1994.