Among the resigners, there are two chiefs of staff, six press officers or social media managers, cultural advisers and a secretary. Of the ten former employees contacted, only one told us that they were not concerned by a problem of harassment or suffering at work. The others all requested strict anonymity.
“Delphine is always right, it’s never her fault and she knows everything regarding everything”, begins our witness. “She makes us doubt our skills all the time, she explains to us how our job works when we know our work a priori”, continues this ex-collaborator of the socialist alderman.
Another continues: “there is a double discourse in the head of the alderman and that is what is difficult. There is benevolence, feminism and an approach to the four-day work week in appearance, and in concrete reality , it’s the opposite. (…) I found myself working 75-80 hours a week, it was quite intense. Well, at the beginning, we want to be seen well, I’m still young, so we try to make a good impression and then, followingwards, I quickly realized that it would never work.
We ask a third person how his time at Delphine Houba’s office was. The answer comes: “Horribly badly, I have no image of professional experience going worse than that”. This former collaborator also saw the chief of staff of the alderman literally get “broken” according to his own term. Break how?
“Humanly, morally. She humiliated him in front of us in team meetings, all the time, even when he wasn’t there, she criticized him, she had contempt for him. It was impressive. And then, following him, it fell on me and on the secretary and we left, one by one…”
