Mitsubishi 'sorry' for cover-up

MITSUBISHI executives issued a grovelling apology today for covering up details of defects with their vehicles which should have resulted in recalls.

Chief executive Yoichiro Okazaki admitted that the company was in 'serious trouble', but said he would do his best to carry out a proposed revival plan.

The Tokyo-based company‘s image has been severely damaged by disclosures earlier this year that it had broken a promise four years ago to stop hiding defects in its vehicles. For decades, the car giant systematically covered up faults to avoid the costs of recalls.

It is not known how many vehicles with defects may have come to the UK. The company is best known here for its 4x4 Shogun vehicles and light trucks.

Former and current Mitsubishi officials have been arrested on charges of professional negligence and other offences resulting in death in two fatal accidents in 2002 involving Mitsubishi trucks in which wheel and clutch-system defects are suspected.

Police say officials failed to follow orders from authorities to report faults even after promising to stop the cover-up.

Investors today demanded action by the company‘s directors to get to grips with the scale of the cover-ups problem.

Okazaki promised the company will strengthen quality control and bring in outsiders to monitor corporate ethics and promote social responsibility in its workers' ranks.

'We will carry out the plan. That's the only way we can answer your concerns,' said Hideyasu Tagaya, whose appointment as president was approved at a shareholder meeting earlier today. Okazaki had been acting as president since April, when his predecessor Rolf Eckrodt, an executive sent in by DaimlerChrysler, resigned.

Following Eckrodt‘s departure DaimlerChrysler announced that it would not put any more money into the group and planned to reduce its stake from 37% to 20%.

The crisis over the defects cover-up has proved disastrous for sales. Car sales have plunged in recent months, and governments and other public bodies in Japan have suspended orders of Mitsubishi buses and other vehicles.

On Monday, Mitsubishi Motors appointed Noboru Matsuda, a former prosecutor and Ministry of Justice official, to head the company's ethics committee made up of outsiders to advise the board of directors on ethics and quality issues.

Mitsubishi has reported a loss for the fiscal year ended 31 March and expects to stay in the red this year. The company says it hopes to return to the black by March 2007.