TESTIMONY
"Finally, I'm overheard," reacts Brigitte * to the microphone of Europe 1. More than two years after the complaint of this Swiss fifties, who accuses Tariq Ramadan of having raped her in a hotel in Geneva, in October 2008, l the Islamologist, prosecuted for four other alleged rapes, was heard for the first time in this aspect of the case, Thursday in Paris. Tariq Ramadan being under judicial supervision, representatives of the Geneva prosecution made the trip for this hearing as part of the investigation for rape and sexual coercion opened in September 2018 in Switzerland. Seeing progress in this new stage, the complainant, kept silent for long months, tells Europe 1 exclusively "hell" that she says she lived. "I doubted everything, justice, by dint of shouting in the desert", testifies the one who denounces a rape committed, according to her, at the end of October 2008.
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"He hands me his business card, and there are exchanges on the internet"
At the time, Brigitte and Tariq Ramadan "frequent the same places" and have relationships in common. "It was a friend who drew me to a signing session, at a time when I was quite active in human rights," she recalls. "I thought, at that time, that he had an audible message and that he exuded a certain kindness."
The 50-year-old claims not to have been "courted". "He hands me his business card and there are exchanges on the internet, on Facebook in particular. We exchange a lot, him a little, just enough to give me confidence. (...) I have a lot writing, poems, a little bit of everything. Things that touched me at the time. "
At the end of October of the same year, the Islamologist offered Brigitte a drink, "on the sidelines of a private conference". "We arranged on the day, more or less on the hour, but not quite. He phoned me to tell me the place at the last moment, to tell me to come and join him. What I did." The meeting is fixed in a hotel. "When I arrived at the reception, (...) I was informed that he was waiting for me in my room. I did not think that I would be alone, I thought that we would be on a small committee, for me it was a summary of the conference. "
"I feel like I have been completely fooled and deceived"
Brigitte refuses to go up and waits "long enough" for Tariq Ramadan in the hotel lobby. When he gets down, the two sit down for tea "in the breakfast room". "It was rather relaxed," recalls the 50-something. The hotel laundry being closed, the Islamologist asked that we bring him enough to iron a shirt for an interview for the next day. When the receptionist returns with the iron and the board, he specifies that the room will close.
"He handed me the iron, he handed the board to Mr. Ramadan and he invited us to leave," says Brigitte. "For good education, and because we kept chatting, I took the iron and I went up to the room. (...) I have the feeling to have been completely fooled and deceived all along. There was no offer to which I could have said yes or no. "
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Arriving upstairs, the complainant claims that she did not recognize the polite man with whom she spoke. "It was someone else. (...) It was no longer funny, it was very fast. I did not even have time to sit down. It was an attack , I lived it like that, "she breathes, not going into the details of the rape she says she suffered.
"Now it's going to be a fight, it's going to be hard"
Then Brigitte describes "months of hell". "I had echoes of aggression until the end of 2009. (...) At this point, I wanted only one thing, it is that it stops this forever. And then from mid-2010 , I no longer had any feedback. I had a child, I picked up a bit. " It was the other complaints filed against the Islamologist, starting in 2017, that pushed her to denounce the facts she says she suffered. "I did not reproach Mr. Ramadan for sleeping with the whole world, he does what he wants with his life. But I reproached the aggression."
"There is always a moment of euphoria when we file a complaint, because we say to ourselves: that's it, it's done, now we're going to let justice be done. And then finally we discover that justice is not done necessarily, or in any case not at the rate we would have thought of ", continues the complainant.
Especially since a Swiss procedure has forced the fifties to be silent for two years. "Barely two months after the complaint was made, there was a request to 'silence' the opposing party," she said. "It took me quite a few years to come out of my silence, and I was pushed back by any means."
"It was very devastating, this threat of being silenced, while on the other side there were books coming out, there were TV sets," she continues. Twice, the highest Swiss courts have proven wrong the advice of Tariq Ramadan, definitively dismissed last February: Brigitte is now allowed to speak. "The lead screed has been removed. Now it's going to be a fight, it's going to be hard, but it's reassuring that something is finally happening."
* The first name has been changed