A diplomat at the embassy of France in Benin in July 2008, Françoise Nicolas was repatriated to France in 2010 after an attack on her following her discovery of a scandal suggesting the embezzlement of public funds in Benin.

Since Tuesday, March 16, 2021, Françoise Nicolas Former official at the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, is totally removed from the ministry. "In 2009, I did not denounce but reported internally these embezzlement of public funds that engaged my responsibility. Today, I denounce them!", reiterated the whistleblower on Twitter this Monday, May 24, 2021.

Being at the time in change from the "Scholarships, Missions, and Invitations" at the Embassy of the France in Cotonou, Françoise Nicolas, reported since December 2009 the implementation of a system of fictitious expenses: "The files were empty but the expenses were very real".

Alerts to the hierarchy of the embassy, led at the time by Hervé Besancenot, seized several times of the central administration, in Paris... all his actions failed on a "disciplinary repatriation".