Ford chief is ousted by family

A coup at the struggling Ford Motor Company has ousted chief executive and president Jac Nasser and put a Ford family member back in the top executive job for the first time since the late Seventies.

Reports from America said the company, which controls a swathe of car marques - including Volvo, Lincoln, Land Rover, Jaguar and Aston Martin - had replaced Mr Nasser with current chairman Bill Ford. Mr Ford, 44, becomes the first family member to sit in the chief executive's seat since Henry Ford II, grandson of the founder, stepped down in 1979.

Mr Nasser, 53, became chief executive in 1999, promising to focus on customer needs. He has run into difficulties in recent months, culminating in a profit warning from the world's second largest car maker, a swathe of redundancies, and losses of more than $1 billion in the last six months. The company has been forced to recall up to 20 million Firestone tyres fitted to its vehicles, and been hit by falling quality, productivity, and tight prices in the international car market.

Mr Nasser's demise is unlikely to be mourned by workers at Ford's Dagenham plant, which is earmarked for closure and being wound down. The abrasive Lebanese-born Australian has also axed over 5,000 white-collar jobs in US operations as part of a review designed to stem mounting losses.

Mr Nasser, who joined the company 33 years ago, has become an isolated figure. A whispering campaign against him seems to have started early this year. A management reshuffle in August increased Bill Ford's involvement in the day-to-day running of the company and only last week he refused to back Mr Nasser publicly.

The revamp is likely to be good news for Sir Nick Scheele, who was recently parachuted in to troubleshoot the group's ailing North American business, and is likely to become chief operating officer.