Jean-Michel Aulas is stepping back from his position as chief opponent at Lyon town hall, held by ecologist Grégory Doucet, after a rape complaint concerning one of his former advisors, his group announced on Friday June 12.
The municipal councilors of the Cœur Lyonnais group, which brings together right-wing and center parties as well as members of civil society elected behind the former boss of OL, met two days after the first articles on this complaint.
On this occasion, “Jean-Michel Aulas, President of the group, and Laure Cédat, Vice-President, made the proposal to withdraw from the governance of the group to preserve the unity of the collective”, according to a press release signed Cœur Lyonnais. Despite this withdrawal, two advisors left the group. “We can no longer sit with them,” explained the LR mayor of the 2nd arrondissement, Pierre Oliver, referring to a “very tough” meeting.
The day before, Jean-Michel Aulas refused to withdraw from the Métropole de Lyon, of which he has been first vice-president since March, despite calls from LR president, Véronique Sarselli, and elected representatives of the majority. This crisis erupted after the revelation on Wednesday that a young activist involved in Jean-Michel Aulas’s campaign had filed a complaint in May for rape by chemical submission against the campaign’s communications director.
Its delegations withdrawn by the metropolis
According to her complaint, the facts occurred in January in a hotel room, and she informed the candidate Aulas and some of his relatives in February. The former businessman explains that, from that moment on, he kept his advisor away from campaign headquarters, without dismissing him. According to his lawyer, the communications director “firmly and calmly contests any accusation”.
The president of the Metropolis of Lyon, Véronique Sarselli (LR), also announced that she was temporarily withdrawing the delegations of Jean-Michel Aulas and two other elected officials, after a complaint of rape against a former advisor of the latter.
In an interview with Progrès, Véronique Sarselli explains having to “guarantee the exemplary nature and functioning of the metropolitan institution which is plunged into complete malaise” and claims to have made her decision “in perfect agreement” with the former boss of Olympique Lyonnais. “The law does not allow me (…) to resign them and I never had the desire to do so,” she specifies about Jean-Michel Aulas and two members of the “Grand coeur lyonnais” community group, Laure Cédat and Emmanuel Imberton.
