New turbulence linked to the Olivier Duhamel affair, political scientist targeted by an investigation for rape of a minor: the prefect of Île-de-France Marc Guillaume announced his resignation from Sciences Po, just before the expected appointment of an interim president of the National Foundation for Political Science (FNSP).
Marc Guillaume: exit the FNSP, the review Powers, the Century club …
“Having frequented Olivier Duhamel for years, I feel betrayed and absolutely condemn these acts,” Marc Guillaume said on Wednesday in a brief statement. “I was totally unaware of the existence of such crimes before the publication of this book and the articles announcing it,” he says.
Secretary-General of the Government from 2015 to 2020, the Prefect resigns his duties on the Board of Directors of the FNSP, headed until now by Olivier Duhamel. He also gives up co-management of the journal Powers, founded by the same Duhamel, and the vice-presidency of the very elitist Siècle club, also chaired by Olivier Duhamel before he resigned from all his functions.
Elisabeth Guigou abandons her mission on incest
At the same time this Wednesday, the former Minister of Justice Elisabeth Guigou announced that she was giving up chairing the independent commission on incest, after being cited among those close to Olivier Duhamel.
“The current climate does not allow me to lead this mission with the necessary serenity. I therefore made the decision to hand over the baton and to give up chairing this commission”, she said in a written statement, affirming that she “ignored all these years the extremely serious facts denounced by Camille Kouchner in his book”.
The Commission on Incest and Sexual Violence Suffered in Childhood was set up a month ago. Its work, intended to better understand and act against this scourge, was to start in a few weeks.
“I accepted (to chair it) because this subject is close to my heart” but “since the courageous revelations of Camille Kouchner, some of the commentators have thought it necessary to link me to this affair of which I am neither closely nor from afar “, explains Ms. Guigou.
The former socialist minister, whose name is not mentioned in the book, was close to the family. Three times, she went to the vacation home of the couple formed by Olivier Duhamel and Evelyne Pisier, mother of Camille Kouchner and her twin brother, named “Victor” in the book, for a few days.
“During these short stays, I did not witness any gesture, behavior, or inappropriate images”, writes Ms. Guigou, assuring that “from the middle of the 2000s”, she no longer met Olivier. Duhamel “only occasionally”.
After the publication of Camille Kouchner’s book
The affair was triggered at the beginning of January by the revelations of Camille Kouchner in his book “La Familia grande”, which denounces the incestuous attacks that his stepfather, Olivier Duhamel, now aged 70, would have imposed on his twin brother when he was a teenager in the late 1980s.
Since then, the debate has raged on the silence that has long surrounded the acts alleged against Olivier Duhamel, a man of networks and influence.
In this context, calls for resignation targeted the director of Sciences Po Frédéric Mion, who admitted to having been alerted in 2019. According to The world, the latter had initially entrusted his intention to warn Marc Guillaume. Questioned by the daily, Frédéric Mion however denied having done so, arguing that a “secretary general of the government is not responsible for the prevention of sexual crimes”.
On Monday, Laurence Parisot, the former president of Medef and member of the board of directors of the FNSP, on the other hand refused to ask for the resignation of Frédéric Mion. “We must not confuse the story of Olivier Duhamel and the story of Frédéric Mion, we are not in the same category of faults,” she said to Mediapart.
Camille Kouchner: “There is only one culprit”
Camille Kouchner thinks that Olivier Duhamel will escape a trial because of the prescription, she explained on France 5 this Wednesday evening. The facts denounced in his book “La Familia grande” date back to the end of the 1980s, and were probably prescribed 10 years after the majority of the victim, the son of the former minister Bernard Kouchner, who never lodged a complaint and do not wish to do so.
“I told him the story, because I was writing the book. Already that has this virtue. He is 12 years old my son, and he said to me: OK, OK, I could see that there had something wrong, because you were pretty much brought up by someone I never met, ”she said. “So now he is going to be condemned? I tell him: well no. (…) I had just told him a terrible thing (…) and I then said to him: well no, there is nothing more we can do do, ”she added.
Camille Kouchner nevertheless felt that her stepfather was reduced to “silence” by these accusations. “I had to be silent for years, for 30 years of silence. Now I find that silence is for him (…) It’s not even a story of punishment, it’s just that ‘he hears that this is unforgivable, and that it will last a lifetime, ”she said.
“He did something that is unforgivable, unforgivable. So I do not forgive him,” said the author. “Physically he didn’t do anything to me, morally he hurt me a lot.”
She also called not to attack those who knew and remained silent: “I would not want to be run into them, because there is only one culprit”.
Alain Finkielkraut fired from LCI
Another consequence of this case, the philosopher Alain Finkielkraut was fired Tuesday from LCI, where he intervened as a columnist, for comments Monday on the news channel. The intellectual there said “against a generalized lynching” of Olivier Duhamel. “Was there consent? At what age did it start? Was there some form of reciprocity or not?” He asked. “We are talking about a teenager”, not a child, “and in addition even to specify the crime, it is necessary to know whether there was consent or not” declared the philosopher.
Source: A la Une – Le Progrès | Le Progrès by www.leprogres.fr.
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