dismiss Oba proved abortive, and he continued to direct the company. SOTELCO's finances were in a poor state in early 2005, but Oba anticipated that the problems would be resolved. The MSD While directing SOTELCO, Oba devoted considerable time and money to sports as well as involvement in politics. He founded a political party, the MSD, which was part of the Presidential Majority and loyal to President Sassou Nguesso; ideologically it identified itself with social democracy. It held its constitutive congress at Dolisie in March 2007. Oba led the MSD as its President, while Jean-François Obembé was designated as Secretary-General and a National Convention of 476 members, as well as a Political Bureau of 159 members, were established. In an interview, Oba stressed the need for "a new discourse that focuses on the real problems of the Congolese people". In the June 2007 parliamentary election, Oba's new party performed fairly well, winning five seats in the National Assembly. Oba stood as the MSD candidate in the fifth constituency of Talangaï, a district of Brazzaville. In the first round of voting, he received 47.07% of the vote against 38.31% for André Mbola, the candidate of the Congolese Labour Party (PCT). Because Oba fell short of an outright majority, he faced Mbola in a second round of voting. Oba narrowly defeated Mbola to win the seat in the August 2007 second round, receiving 51.06% of the vote. According to Oba, his party spent more than one billion CFA francs on its 2007 election campaign. The high level of spending outraged many people, as it was unclear where the money had come from. Oba denied rumors that he had diverted money from SOTELCO to finance his party's campaign; on the same occasion, he said that SOTELCO had not received any subsidies from the state since the end of the 1997 civil war, making it the only one of Congo-Brazzaville's top five companies to have not benefited from a subsidy during that period. He observed that much of the company's technical capacity had been damaged during the war and said that 22 billion CFA francs were needed to repair the telecommunications network in Brazzaville, adding that SOTELCO needed to improve services in order to remain competitive in the context of economic liberalization. Although Oba's political party had performed well in the 2007 election and he had lavished praise on Sassou Nguesso, he was not