Renault COO Patrick Pelata offers to resign.
Renault’s top two execs have apologized to three other senior managers wrongfully accused in what was initially billed as a Chinese spy case – but which now appears to have been a scam by members of the French automaker’s own security team.
Renault’s second-in-command offered to resign on Monday, while authorities question a corporate security official who could reveal the details of what is now seen as an internal fraud. Meanwhile, the three executives fired after being accused of spying are now set to receive “reparations,” according to Renault.
The carmaker’s top two executives, Chief Executive Carlos Ghosn and Chief Operating Officer Daniel Pelata, said through a spokesperson that they “acknowledge the enormous personal harm that the (fired employees) and their families have suffered.” As a result, “their honor in the public eye will be restored (and) reparations (will) be made.”
The mess began when Renault received an anonymous tip indicating the three managers, Michel Balthazard, Bertrand Rochette and Matthieu Tenenbaum, were secretly on the Chinese payroll and leaking information about Renault’s expansive electric vehicle program. They were suspended on January 11, Renault claiming it had proof they were receiving “funds from a foreign source.”
But after an initial, in-house investigation, things took an unexpected turn. Government investigators found the evidence produced by Renault’s team lacking. Swiss bank account numbers, for example, proved fictitious. And evidence began pointing back to the corporate security team, a member of which was arrested at Charles de Gaulle airport, over the weekend, as he tried to flee the country.
After the arrest of Renault security member Dominique Gevrey – a one-time member of the French Defense Ministry of Intelligence – Paris prosecutor Jean-Claude Marin suggested, “Renault is perhaps not a victim of indelicate employees but of fraud.”
At a Monday news conference, prosecutor Marin said of Renault’s Gevrey, “Everything he provided (as evidence) is false or non-existent.”
Senior Renault officials have promised that appropriate steps would be taken to rectify matters, Pelata saying that even he could face disciplinary action. But his offer to resign has been rejected by CEO Ghosn, who is also coming under fire for earlier comments about the alleged spies.
In January, he expressed “certitude” about the evidence, which included “multiple” forms of evidence.
It is unclear whether the apologies of promises of reparations will be enough to defuse the scandal and save the jobs of Ghosn and Pelata.