PARIS – The director of a prestigious French university of political science resigned on Tuesday night, weeks after accusations of incest involving one of the school’s most prominent figures raised suspicions about who might have heard of the charges and fell silent.
Frédéric Mion, who has been the director of the university, Sciences Po, since 2013, said in a letter to students that he had decided to resign after a report by Ministry of Education inspectors pointed to “errors of judgment in my handling of the allegations that were communicated me in 2018, and inconsistencies in the way I communicated about this case after it came up. “
Mr. Mion, 51, was under increasing pressure from students to resign after it became clear that he took no action against Olivier Duhamel, a longtime professor who also headed the board supervising Sciences Po, despite knowing of the charges against it .
In the latest in a series of sexual abuse scandals that rocked France’s intellectual and political elite, Duhamel, a well-known 70-year-old intellectual, was accused by his stepdaughter, Camille Kouchner, of abusing his twin brother from the beginning when he was 14 years old.
Since then, Duhamel has resigned from all positions he held, saying he was determined to “preserve the institutions in which I work”. The Paris prosecutor’s office quickly announced that it was opening an investigation into allegations of child rape and sexual assault.
The charges appeared in a book published last month, “La Familia Grande”, by Mrs. Kouchner, who painted an uncompromising portrait of Duhamel, but also of the small world of intellectuals, artists and politicians around her, which she accused of owning largely protected his stepfather.
“Very quickly,” she writes, “the microcosm of the people in power, Saint-Germain-des-Prés, was informed. Many people knew, and most pretended that nothing had happened. “
Jean Veil, a prominent Paris lawyer and a close friend of Duhamel, acknowledged in the newspaper Le Monde that he knew about sexual abuse, but kept his silence for “professional secrecy”. Marc Guillaume, a senior civil servant and former secretary general of the French government, said he had heard of “sexual problems” – but not accusations of incest – involving Duhamel, according to French magazine Marianne.
Mion said he was alerted to the charges in 2018 by a former Minister of Culture, Aurélie Filippetti. He said he took no action due to the lack of tangible evidence and because Veil told him it was just rumors.
But in a telephone interview on Tuesday, Filippetti said Mion called her after the accusations were made public last month in the book and said, “We shouldn’t let anyone think we knew.”
Filippetti said the call “froze” her.
In 2018, she said, she trusted Mion to “at least” remove Duhamel from his position at Sciences Po.
“You can’t just sweep it under the rug when it comes to something so bad,” said Filippetti.
Léon Thébault, one of the many Sciences Po students who asked for Mion’s departure, said the scandal “revealed the mechanisms put in place by Mr. Mion to preserve an omertà” – but that ended up encouraging people across society to speak openly about sexual abuse.
In his letter of resignation, Mr. Mion said that the Ministry of Education report confirmed “that no organized silence or complacency system existed in our establishment”.
The charges against Duhamel triggered a torrent of reports from people across France who said they were victims of incest. The disclosure on French social networks brought to light what many consider a widespread problem in the country.
An independent commission created by the government to investigate incest has been reinvigorated with the appointment of two new co-chairs. Her former president, Elisabeth Guigou, resigned in early January because of her close ties to Duhamel, although she said she was unaware of the abuse allegations.
After the wave of reports on social media, President Emmanuel Macron promised tougher laws on child sexual abuse.
“Today, shame is changing sides,” said Macron in a video posted on Twitter. “Nobody can ignore these experiences anymore.”
Gaëlle Fournier contributed to the research.