Adèle Haenel, Alice Coffin... and 188 women demand the immediate resignation of Minister Damien Abad, accused of rape

"Why do you put men accused of rape at the head of the state?"

Since Laura, a young 18-year-old high school student, arrested President Emmanuel Macron during a visit to Tarn (Occitanie) on June 9, the rumble has swelled on social networks and elsewhere.

This Monday, June 20, 188 women signed a column in

 to demand the immediate resignation of Damien Abad, Minister of Solidarity, accused of rape and attempted rape.

"Can Damien Abad, as his functions require, embody the general interest?" Ask the signatories of this missive.

Among them, elected representatives of the opposition, journalists, feminists and artists, including the writer Alice Coffin, the actress Adèle Haenel,

The question is simple, insists the text: "Can he, when three women accuse him of rape or attempted rape and that many people, including elected officials of the Republic, have testified to completely inappropriate?”.

Damien Abad denies all the charges against him, pointing to

in which the facts were reported.

But the text continues: “In a company, if a person accused of sexual harassment was protected by his employer, kept in post, without internal investigation, without preventive measures, without layoff while an investigation is deployed, the responsibility of the company could be engaged.

(…) Why would ministers be above the laws that apply to the whole of society?

In video, accusations against Damien Abad: Elisabeth Borne "invites" the victims to file a complaint

“Disrespect, injunction and insistence”

Written under the impetus of the Observatory of sexist and sexual violence in politics and the feminist association #NousToutes, this initiative therefore comes back, in the first place, to the actions of the Minister of Solidarity, according to the revelations published in

, the June 14.

Three women accuse the representative of sexual assault.

Among them, Margaux, who says "having lived in January 2011 a sexual relationship imbued with disrespect, injunction and insistence", even if it was first consented.

However, she claimed to have pronounced her refusal several times, without being heard.

The second alleged victim of the elected official ensures that she was drugged in 2010, after meeting the Minister of Solidarity "in a bar".

With

, she says she "woke up the next morning in a hotel room with the politician, in her underwear and in a state of shock and deep disgust", relays the French news site.

Finally, an elected centrist who remained anonymous also explains that she was drugged when she was at the representative's home.

According to his words, the latter would have offered him a drink with “something in it”.

Worried, she would have gone to the bathroom to spit out the drink, while he was waiting for her in front of the door.

A fight would have followed, the latter managing to strike him "a blow in the stomach", before fleeing from the apartment.

To read also Five-year term of Emmanuel Macron: what results for women?

Demonstration

Following the tribune in

, nearly a hundred women gathered on Monday, June 20, on the Place du Châtelet in Paris to demand the "immediate" resignation of the Minister of Solidarity.

At the same time, the demonstrators also targeted the case of Gérald Darmanin, accused since 2017 of rape by Sophie Patterson-Spatz, for facts which date back to 2009. If the investigating judge had closed the investigations in September 2021, the case remains in abeyance since the latter must now decide whether to issue a dismissal order, as required by the Public Prosecutor's Office, or to relaunch the investigation.

The Home Secretary has always denied the charges, but he admitted that a report had taken place, according to him consented.

“We want to draw attention to the huge gap between the second “pseudo” great cause of Emmanuel Macron’s five-year term and the continued government of Gérald Darmanin and Damien Abad, two men accused of rape and gender-based violence, in government. “, explained Fatima Benomar, of #NousToutes, as reported by AFP.