The president of the High Council for Equality leaves her post following an internal revolt over “stigmatizing remarks”

Sylvie Pierre-Brossolette “wanted to end her duties herself in order to preserve the HCE and its work,” explained Minister Aurore Bergé on Tuesday.

The decision was published in the Official Journal on Tuesday, July 16. Weakened by an internal revolt, the president of the High Council for Equality between Women and Men (HCE), Sylvie Pierre-Brossolette, left her post to “preserve” the instance and is replaced by the former minister Bérangère Couillard.

“Sylvie Pierre-Brossolette wished to end her duties herself in order to preserve the HCE and its work”, assures the resigning Minister responsible for Equality between Women and Men and the Fight against Racism, Aurore Bergé, in a message sent to AFP on Wednesday. “I have therefore accepted her resignation. I thank her for the essential work of the HCE and the new visibility that has been given to it with her vice-presidents,” she adds.

According to the decree dated July 16, published Wednesday in the Official Journal, “the functions of Ms Sylvie Pierre-Brossolette are terminated in the interests of the service.”

The latter, specifies another decree, is replaced by Bérangère Couillard, former Macronist minister delegate in charge of Equality between women and men and former member of parliament for Gironde, defeated in the last legislative elections. “Not wanting any vacancy, with the Prime Minister, we proceeded with the appointment of Bérangère Couillard” Who “had covered essential subjects, notably the fight against the pornographic industry”, underlines Aurore Bergé.

The question of whether Sylvie Pierre-Brossolette should remain at the head of the HCE was raised in May, notably by the CGT, after the revelation by Mediapart of a letter dated January 2, 2024 in which employees of the general secretariat of the body said they had been “frequently witnessed comments on the edge of legality made by the president and co-presidents.”

The management team was notably accused of having held “violent remarks in a humorous tone contributing to trivializing and spreading rape culture and making victims feel guilty”of the “stigmatizing remarks about LGBT+ people, repeated despite warnings on the subject”or even “racist and Islamophobic remarks”. Contacted by AFP at the time, Ms Pierre-Brossolette had “formally contested” the accusations against her and had denounced a “will to destabilize” the HCE and its line “abolitionist and universalist”.