Nissan Motor Co. President and Chief Executive Officer Hiroto Saikawa has stepped down over an excess pay scandal of his own ¡ª less than a year after he declared the automaker¡¯s departure from a regime led by former Chairman Carlos Ghosn, who was arrested and charged with underreporting his compensation and misappropriating the company¡¯s money.
Since the exit of Ghosn, a charismatic leader who led the automaker for two decades after turning it around from the brink of collapse, Nissan has been hurt by sharply plunging profits and faces a host of challenges, including reviewing its relations with its top shareholder, Renault SA of France. Saikawa¡¯s successor, who is to be chosen by the end of October, needs to take further steps to reform the company¡¯s governance and create a new management regime that can deal with the challenges and rebuild the automaker.
When he took over following Ghosn¡¯s arrest last November, there was criticism that Saikawa, who as a close aide to Ghosn played a key role as co-CEO since 2016 and CEO and president since 2017, would be the top executive taking charge of restructuring the company¡¯s management, especially since he had overlooked for years the suspected financial wrongdoing by the former chairman.
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