duty of truth
“I was condemned before being judged. I reveal here all that has been hidden from you. This is the story of a long trial and a rebirth. »
Share

Paperback
EAN13 9782845927957
ISBN 978-2-84592-795-7
Publisher Presses du Châtelet
Release date 09/11/2019
Essays Collection
Number of pages 288
Size 22 x 14 x 2cm
Weight 380g
French language

Presentation
This book is not a plea for my defense. Nor is it an invitation to feel sorry for myself. It is the story, frank and sincere, of a difficult and painful ordeal.

I have transcribed in the following pages the thoughts and feelings that have inhabited me since October 20, 2017 (date of the first complaint filed against me and accusing me of rape), until the moment I write these lines in April 2019. A year and a half that turned everything upside down in me and around me, as if a hurricane had hit my life. Nine and a half months in prison, a relentless media deluge, a shaken family, deep suffering, tears and a multitude of questions. Not to mention my state of health which has seriously worsened: the symptoms of my multiple sclerosis have colonized my body. For more than a year, I could only walk with a walker.

By following the chronology of events, I came back to the different stages of this case. Police custody, at the end of January 2018, took me to another reality and made me enter a universe that was unknown to me. The police, the judges, the prison and complete isolation. Whereas, for more than thirty years, I had been accustomed to traveling once or several times a week, while my life was defined by intense activity, suddenly everything stopped dead. I wanted, in this book, to tell my experience, to translate my feelings and to give an account of my reflections, my convictions as much as my wounds.

The presentation of the different stages of the ordeal, from police custody to the media campaign that preceded it, from Fleury-Mérogis prison to the hearings of the judges, from Fresnes to my release, is crossed by my reflections on the state of the world, French society, justice, the prison system, dehumanization, etc. I also transcribed my meditations on life, faith, the quest for God and meaning, the destiny of men, adversity, forgiveness and death. I also took the time to take stock of my conscience: my past, my mistakes, my weaknesses and my hopes. Despite the prison and isolation, I received a lot of love during this ordeal.

How do I explain what happened to me? If I'm innocent, then why did these women lie? Why, in the era of #MeToo and #BalanceTonPorc (the difference in wording is in itself revealing), have we so quickly dubbed and made credible complaints whose presentation was, in itself, implausible? Why, when you add it up, was I the only man thrown in jail like this? Why did the presumption of innocence count for nothing in my case? Finally, why, when I proclaimed my innocence and denied the accusations, did the media and so many intellectuals and chroniclers conclude that I “persisted in denying”? By what intellectual and social force were all these minds so quickly convinced of my guilt despite the countless lies of the plaintiffs and the absence of objective proof? Many have already condemned me, insulted me and demonized me: I was an odious character anyway and if I was not guilty, there was "no smoke without fire" anyway. . The formula is confusing. What does the smoke of a crime say if objectively the crime does not exist?

Isn't there a political reason for the way my case was handled and investigated? The participants in the rallies organized regularly in front of the EPSNF in Fresnes and who chanted: “Free Tariq Ramadan! Tariq Ramadan, political prisoner! were they wrong? Considering political data is crucial and sheds new light on my business. The latter says something not only about political maneuvers and media manipulation but, more profoundly, about the state of France, its difficulty in coming to terms with its colonial past, in thinking positively about its cultural and religious diversity, in conceiving a true human and civic equality between all the women and all the men who constitute it today.

This test was an initiation. Thrown into prison and called, by a brutal and unjust decision, to face my conscience and to take stock of my existence, I tried to get the best out of it. It was necessary, in the holistic sense, to regain health, to heal, and to grow. This was my quest, that of transparency, sincerity, harmony and peace.

On the road, of course, you have to overcome resentment, resentment; leave behind adversities, dark thoughts and reproaches. Ask forgiveness from those we have hurt or disappointed, and forgive those who have hurt us. To better love those we love and free ourselves from the animosity or disappointments of those whose lives and hearts have separated us.

At the end of the night, Bardamu, the character of Céline, had apprehended the nonsense, the human misery, the deep malaise tied to the torture of the conscience. My night had fallen, of course, and I had no other choice than to go through it with humility and confidence in dialogue alone and silently with God, with my heart and the beings I love. At the end of my night an illuminated horizon is revealed to me, a light, the negative of Céline's negative. Morning. Here, there is certainly no illusion about the wickedness of men and their capacity to dehumanize and destroy, but there is a stronger conviction and a stronger hope. At dawn, we see a path emerge, a way to walk, grow and be reborn. Rather than setting your sights on the world, come back to yourself. The journey into the night is a journey to the end of oneself. Here, deep within, there is a spark which requires discipline, courage and love and which is a promise of spiritual health and healing. A deposit, a wisdom. At the end of the night, anything is possible. It is this essential teaching, for myself, for each one, for all, that I would like, with humility, to share here with the reader.

​

Tariq Ramadan