Jean-Luc Mélenchon recognizes it: the result of the procedures of the committee against sexual and sexist violence (CVSS) of La France insoumise (LFI) is not “not yet satisfactory”. In an interview at Release, published Thursday, July 7, the former LFI presidential candidate believes that” we must think “ to improve these procedures, again strongly questioned Thursday by Taha Bouhafs.
The subject of a report to the LFI committee for accusations of sexual violence, the 25-year-old journalist had his nomination in the June legislative elections withdrawn by the party founded by Jean-Luc Mélenchon. On Tuesday, Taha Bouhafs published a six-page letter, in which he exposed his anger at having been divested on the basis of several testimonies from “sexual violence” that LFI would never have revealed to him. His lawyers on Thursday denounced a procedure “outside the law” conducted by LFI’s CVSS.
In his press release, Mr. Bouhafs specifically attacked Clémentine Autain. He criticized the LFI deputy for Seine-Saint-Denis for having refused to confront him with an accuser and to communicate to him the details of the charges, but also for having wanted to conceal the real reason for his dismissal, by prompting him to instead assert the weight of racist attacks against him.
” I do not know the answer “
The party defended itself by explaining that it could not send him “the information sent to the cell”nor organize a confrontation, in the name of “the desire for anonymity of the complainants”, while emphasizing that Mr. Bouhafs could be heard by his authorities. “If justice had the means to do its job, if society seriously supported the victims, we would perhaps no longer be there, looking for necessarily imperfect ways to fill the chain of failures”replied Clémentine Autain.
“The current situation is not satisfactory. You can’t wash your hands of any aspect of the human outcome it givesbelieves Jean-Luc Mélenchon in the interview with Release. The system itself is looking for its equilibrium point. Deciding to believe the word of women is an arbitrary choice but we assume it. But that can’t be enough.”he adds.
According to him, it is necessary to “to be able to tell the person who complained ‘I believe you’ and take the necessary measures” while taking into account, at the same time, “of a young man of 25 who asks to be able to present his defense when he is sentenced to life infamy” et “does not know what he is accused of”.
“How to be for the right to defence, the right to adversarial proceedings and, ourselves in certain circumstances, even with legitimate and compelling reasons, to do the opposite. I do not know the answer “, admits the former deputy of Bouches-du-Rhône, acknowledging “run up against a contradiction”.
On the subject of the LFI president of the finance commission, Eric Coquerel, targeted by a complaint for sexual harassment, Jean-Luc Mélenchon is however without appeal: he “is not guilty of anything at all” et “is the subject of a rumor and a political operation”.