Toyota’s Chairman of the Board of Directors Akio Toyoda issued an official statement admitting the company’s involvement in falsifying crash data tests and announcing an internal investigation into the matter. The blame fell on select representatives of the company’s Daihatsu division.
Daihatsu has admitted its own guilt, too, revealing that the four test vehicles the company provided for crash test purposes featured non-standard door panels installed to minimize the risks of injury from side airbags deploying. The actual production cars lack such panels in their design.
The models caught in the scandal are Toyota Agya, Yaris Ativ, Perodua Axia and another production car so far going unnamed in the media reports. While none of these were released under Daihatsu branding, Daihatsu was nonetheless the company responsible for designing and testing all four models. According to the official statistics, the companies have sold around 88,000 affected cars in Asia and South Pacific markets so far.
Daihatsu stressed that its employees had kept the executives in the dark concerning the falsifications. As a result, they were only able to learn about the issue in April this year. An internal investigation conducted based on the informant’s claims confirmed the facts stated above. The sales of all affected cars have now been halted until repeat crash tests are done.
Akio Toyoda asked for an apology on behalf of the company and promised to reveal the results of the internal investigation once it is over.