At the end of the Council of Ministers on Wednesday, Dominique Boutonnat was reappointed at the head of the National Cinema Center (CNC), despite a report criticized by certain filmmakers and an indictment after accusations of sexual assault that he dispute.
On April 25, the Nanterre prosecution requested the referral to the criminal court of Mr. Boutonnat, 52, for sexual assault on his godson, with whom he has no family ties.
In October 2020, a complaint was filed by this young man in his twenties, for facts dating from August 2020 during a vacation in Greece.
The indictment took place in February 2021. Questioned on this point on June 20, during an interview with Le Parisien, the Minister of Culture, Rima Abdul Malak, considered that "the presumption of innocence prevails" and welcomed the results of the president of the CNC.
An appointment already contested three years ago
“He is indicted, not convicted.
It will be up to the courts to decide.
(…) He is the boss of a CNC which has faced the crisis and which, moreover, has been a pioneer in the fight against sexual and gender-based violence, ”she added.
No case law requires the withdrawal or resignation of a civil servant under investigation.
But these accusations weigh on this known film producer, in an already tense context after the non-renewal, in the post-legislative reshuffle, of the Minister of Solidarity Damien Abad, targeted by an investigation following a complaint for attempted rape .
The appointment, three years ago, of this donor to Emmanuel Macron's electoral campaign had already gone badly in an environment worried about seeing the imposition of a logic based on profitability, endangering auteur cinema.
A heckled president
In recent weeks, a sling had also been organized around Dominique Boutonnat, the Society of Film Directors (SRF) claiming his head, judging his policy ""openly liberal and too often short-termist".