A Moroccan university professor, sued for “indecent assault with violence” in a case of sexual blackmail targeting female students in exchange for good grades, was sentenced to two years in prison. This is the first verdict delivered in the scandal known as the “sex against good grades”, which splashes the university institution. A lecturer in economics at Hassan I University in Settat, this professor in preventive detention was found guilty of“molestation”, “violence” and “sexual harassment” in front of the criminal chamber of the court of appeal of this city near Casablanca, according to the media. One of the plaintiffs waived any legal action in exchange for compensation of 70,000 dirhams (6,640 euros).
Sex against good grades: A professor at the University of Settat sentenced to two years in prison https://t.co/lq6I7wQXxy pic.twitter.com/qAj5AIjrIG
– TelQuel (@TelQuelOfficiel) January 12, 2022
Four other university professors, two of whom are on bail, are due to appear on Thursday, January 13 in the same case. They face heavy loads: “incitement to debauchery”, “gender discrimination”, “violence against women”… Due to the scandal, the dean of the Faculty of Law and Economics of Settat resigned at the end of November. The so-called case of “sex for good grades” was relayed in September by local media after the dissemination on social networks of messages of a sexual nature exchanged between one of the professors prosecuted and his students.
Other similar scandals have erupted recently. In recent years, several cases of sexual harassment suffered by students from their professors in Moroccan universities have been publicized, but often without complaints being filed. And when they were, most went unanswered.
Filing a complaint against your attacker is a very rare step in a conservative society which most often pushes victims of sexual violence to keep silent, for fear of reprisals, of the eyes of others or to protect the reputation of the family. Human rights associations and the media regularly sound the alarm bells on the violence inflicted on Moroccan women.
In 2018, after years of heated debate, a law entered into force. For the first time, it makes punishable by prison terms for acts “considered to be forms of harassment, assault, sexual exploitation or ill-treatment”. The text was, however, judged “insufficient” by movements for the defense of women’s rights which call for more severity in the face of this scourge.