Nissan’s CEO has resigned from his position after an internal investigation showed he pocketed money from a financial scandal that has already led to the arrest of the car giant’s former chairman.
Hiroto Saikawa has stepped down from the top job at Nissan after acknowledging he received inappropriately inflated remuneration while working at the company.
Mr Saikawa’s resignation comes after a meeting in which Nissan’s board of directors received a report from the company’s audit committee outlining the results of an internal investigation into the misconduct.
In the report Mr Saikawa was implicated in the financial scandal along with a number of others, including former chairman Carlos Ghosn, who has already been arrested by Japanese authorities, and former representative director Greg Kelly.
The report states: “From fiscal year 2009 through fiscal year 2017, Ghosn and former Representative Director Greg Kelly concealed a total of 9.078 billion yen in compensation payable to Ghosn.
“Certain sums were concealed under the guise of deferred post-retirement compensation and treated as if they were not in fact Ghosn’s compensation as a director. These actions resulted in violation of Nissan’s obligation to disclose compensation received by directors in the company’s annual securities reports.”
The investigation also discovered that also found that around 2.271bn yen worth of share and appreciation rights for Mr Ghosn had been hidden by the pair.
The report also accused Mr Saikawa of financial misconduct and states that in 2013, when he was acting as Nissan’s CEO, he asked Mr Kelly to explore ways to increase his executive pay.
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By changing the dates on share appreciation rights were calculated, Mr Saikawa was able to pocket an additional 47m yen (£355,000).
But despite benefiting from the financial misconduct, Nissan said it would not hold Mr Saikawa responsible, as it was unlikely that he knew of the “improper methods used by Kelly and others to increase their compensation”.
However, after being caught up in the scandal Mr Saikawa has resigned from his post as CEO and has been replaced temporarily by Yasuhiro Yamauchi.
In a statement to the company’s investors Nissan said: “Today, the Board of Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. held their regular board of directors meeting. Hiroto Saikawa had indicated recently his willingness to resign. After discussion, the board asked him to resign as representative executive officer and CEO of the company, effective September 16, and he accepted. Effective the same day, Nissan’s representative executive officer and COO, Yasuhiro Yamauchi, will become acting CEO.
“Nissan’s nomination committee will accelerate its efforts to select a successor for the CEO position, with the goal of concluding the search by the end of October.”
The internal investigation has been damning for Carlos Ghosn, once described as the most powerful man in the automotive industry.
The report given to the directors described how he instructed a Nissan subsidiary to make payments of $14.7m (£11.9m) to a dealer outside of Japan who had previously offered him personal financial support.
A separate deal saw him instruct a subsidiary to pay $32m (£25.9m) to another dealer, which then transferred tens of millions of dollars back to Ghosn.