Marlene Awaad | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Carlos Ghosn, chairman of the alliance between Renault SA, Nissan Motor Co. and Mitsubishi Motors Corp., pauses during a Bloomberg Television interview at the Paris Motor Show in Paris, France, on Tuesday, Oct. 2, 2018.
Mitsubishi will propose removing embattled executive Carlos Ghosn from its board of directors, the company said Monday.
Ghosn, who is chairman and CEO of the strategic alliance among French automaker Renault and Japanese carmakers Nissan and Mitsubishi, was arrested Monday in Tokyo on charges of making misleading financial statements to regulators, Mitsubishi said Monday.
Nissan CEO Hiroto Saikawa held a press conference earlier on Monday saying Nissan would seek Ghosn's removal from his roles at Nissan.
Nissan said a whistleblower alerted the company to several instances of alleged misconduct on Ghosn's part, including underreporting compensation to regulators and personal misuse of company money.
In addition to being chairman and CEO of the alliance, the chairman of Nissan, and a board member at Mitsubishi, Ghosn is also the CEO of Renault.
Ghosn began spearheading the alliance between Renault and Nissan in the late 1990s. Many industry veterans were skeptical that an alliance between a French car company and a Japanese carmaker would ever work. But the initiative was successful, and the two were joined by Mitsubishi in 2016.
Here is the full statement from Mitsubishi:
“Mitsubishi Motors Corporation (MMC) today announces that media outlets reported that MMC's Chairman of the Board and Representative Director, Carlos Ghosn, had been arrested by Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office on the charge of filing annual securities reports containing fake statement, in breach of the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act.
“In response to the arrest of Ghosn, and since the alleged misconduct is related to a corporate governance and compliance issue, it is to be proposed to the Board of Directors to promptly remove Ghosn from his position as MMC's Chairman of the Board and Representative Director.
“We will readily conduct an internal investigation on whether Ghosn has been engaged in the misconduct like the above within MMC.
“MMC deeply apologizes for any concern caused by the recent event.”
