(Rabat) Four university professors appeared before the Moroccan courts on Tuesday, accused of sexually blackmailing students in exchange for good grades, an unprecedented scandal that has shattered the university institution.
The so-called “sex for good grades” case was relayed in September by local media after the posting on social networks of sexual messages exchanged between one of the prosecuted professors and his students.
Five academics in total are involved in the scandal. Three were jailed and the other two released on bail.
Four of the accused, teachers at Hassan I University in Settat, a town near Casablanca, face heavy charges: “incitement to debauchery”, “gender discrimination”, “violence against women”, he said. to AFP the same source. Their trial has been adjourned until December 14, according to media reports.
More serious charge
The fifth, who is under arrest, is being charged with “violent indecent assault”, a more serious charge.
He is scheduled to appear at first instance before the criminal chamber of the Settat appeals court on Wednesday, the source familiar with the matter said.
Since the scandal, the dean of the Faculty of Law and Economics of Settat resigned at the end of November and the president of the university could be sanctioned, according to the daily Al Akhbar.
At the same time, an investigation was opened by the National Brigade of the Judicial Police (BNPJ).
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 groups 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 actions “considered to be forms of harassment, assault, sexual exploitation or ill-treatment” punishable by prison terms.
The text was, however, judged “insufficient” by women’s rights movements which call for greater severity in the face of this scourge.
