The party was founded in August 2007 by a merger of Ibrahima Moctar Sarr's Movement for National Reconciliation and the Alliance for Justice and Democracy (AJD) party, with Sarr elected as the leader of the new party. Sarr, a Serer journalist, had been an activist since the 1980s, and his party defined itself as campaigning for equal rights for Pulaar-speakers, Soninké and Wolof people alongside Moors, and the return of Mauritanian refugees from Senegal.[3] Sarr had stood as an independent in the March 2007 presidential election on an anti-racist platform, came in fifth place with 7.95% in the first round[3] and supported Ahmed Ould Daddah for the second round.[4]