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Nigeria’s Consumer Protection Council (CPC) has finally beamed its light on Volkswagen Nigeria, asking the automaker to provide information on the status of its vehicles in relation to the emissions cheating software, which affected 11 million cars worldwide.
The council, in a letter dated October 26, 2015 and signed by its Director General, Dupe Atoki, issued a seven-day ultimatum, asking the company to make available to it the number of affected vehicles in Nigeria (if any), steps taken to inform and sensitise consumers and efforts being made to facilitate quick recall of such vehicles in the country.
The letter obtained by Premium Times, reads: “The attention of the council has been drawn to some publications wherein Volkswagen has admitted the allegation that certain illegal “defeat device” software was installed in Volkswagen vehicles to cheat emission test. The resultant effect of this on the environment and quality of these cars is of great importance to the CPC.
“The publications also indicated that Volkswagen had admitted that vehicles with 1.2, 1.6, and 2.0 litre EA 189 engines are all affected, (i.e. Golf, Beatle, Jetta and Passat models),”
CPC noted that Volkswagen has a huge market in Nigeria, with many customers who may currently be in possession of the affected models.
The CPC’s move comes more than a month after Volkswagen admitted to US authorities that its millions of its brands contained a software that could cheat pollution tests, making them seem cleaner than they actually were.
About 11 million vehicles worldwide manufactured between 2009 and 2015, including 5 million VW cars, 2.1 million Audi, 1.2 million Skoda, 700,000 Seat and 1.8. million vans, are confirmed to have been built with these so-called “defeat devices.”