Presidential candidate’s adviser accused of raping male teen intern
A senior adviser to the French far-right presidential candidate Eric Zemmour has been accused of raping a teenage male intern. He vehemently denies the allegation.
According to France Info, referring to a source close to the case, a complaint against Olivier Ubéda was filed by an 18-year-old man on December 9. The Paris prosecutor’s office launched an investigation the next day and since then several witness hearings have already taken place.
BFMTV’s sources have indicated that an alleged forced sexual relationship began in spring 2021 and continued until autumn. According to their information, the teen accused Ubéda, in particular, of forcing him to perform oral sex.
Ubéda, who is Zemmour’s events director and previously worked for the presidential campaign of Nicolas Sarkozy, has called the allegations “slanderous denunciation.”
“I will only react when I know what and who we are talking about,” he said on Twitter, adding that he is meeting an investigating officer on Tuesday.
“Sometimes #MeToo is just a mytho,” he noted, referring to a popular movement against sexual abuse.
In a separate post, he claimed that rape allegations have become the latest in a series of issues he faced since he started working for Zemmour. His wife Anne Gaudin-Ubéda was dismissed from her position as the cabinet director of the Creuse Department Council’s president, and he accused the tax authorities of becoming “overzealous.”
“You are accused of rape… just that. The scenario is well written. It’s not based on anything real. The media love it. Aiming to break what works. To bedraggle not to let go. To vomit. Who is fooled? Who’s next?” he wrote.
The scandal comes soon after Ubéda’s boss Zemmour, known for his nationalist and far-right views, was fined €10,000 for his remarks on unaccompanied migrant minors, whom he described as “thieves,” “murderers” and “rapists.”
