Almasry Alyoum newspaper covers Volkswagen & AUDI never-ending scandals in Egypt

A few weeks ago Volkswagen chairman Matthias Mueller announced that Volkswagen will focus in the future more on the mobility issues as well as on electric cars, instead of the diesel technology. Which sounds like good news especially ahead of the 2016 Paris Motor Show, where the Volkswagen group is expected to launch several interesting and promising models.

But unfortunately in other parts of the world there are not so many positive news about those well-known and iconic brands of Volkswagen, AUDI and Porsche. While the U.S. Environment Protection Agency EPA launched a new probe on the 3.0-litre diesel engine used in several Volkswagen group brands such as AUDI and Porsche, the Volkswagen and AUDI brands have at the same time also been dragged through the Egyptian court rooms and on the front-pages of the local newspaper and website over the past few weeks and months.

After the coverage on Youm7.com a few weeks ago, the latest coverage of this ongoing Volkswagen Egypt & AUDI Egypt scandal took place in the wide-spread Almasry Alyoum newspaper last week, which in general is considered one of the very few reliable newspaper in Egypt and which currently publishes the only professional automotive supplement with professional test-drives and commentaries done by Ahmed Bahaa El Din.

In what can be called a dirty accusation and reputation war between Karim El Najjar and MEATCO in the media and in the Egyptian court rooms, two of the shareholders of the Egyptian Automotive Company & Trading (EATC), which both represent the Volkswagen, AUDI and SEAT dealerships in Egypt, a lawyer called Mohamed Hammoda appeared in an almost full-page interview in the automotive supplement of the Almasry Alyoum newspaper on Thursday 4th of August, explaining the point of view of his client Karim El Najjar and threatening the other EATC partner, MEATCO, that he will drag and squeeze them in the court rooms.

And although the lawyer did not give any valid nor reasonable explanations regarding the accusations facing his client Karim El Najjar, he accused the other partner MEATCO of financing a paid advertising and media campaign with several newspaper against his client Karim EL Najjar.

In the same page of this interview with the lawyer, the newspaper published a sneak-preview of the interview with Karim El Najjar, co-owner and Managing Director of EATC and owner of the SEAT Egypt dealership Kayan, which is supposed to be published in the automotive supplement of Almasry Alyoum newspaper next Thursday 12th of August 2016. In this preview Karim El Najjar states that some journalists have been 'employed' and actively engaged in this 'dispute' in order to 'heat up' this ongoing conflict.

The last court session was on 13th of July in which the partner MEATCO demanded a court guardian for the Volkswagen & AUDI dealership and to isolate Karim El Najjar from his position as Managing Director. The session had been adjourned to 15th of August.

On the 5th of June we at autoarabia.org had already published a detailed article about this ongoing dispute (click here)

The only losers in this business-harming conflict are the Egyptian consumers and of course the already-damaged reputation of the Volkswagen, AUDI and SEAT brands.

It seems that this Volkswagen-AUDI scandal will continue for a long time in Egypt in case the decision-makers in Wolfsburg and Ingolstadt will not take a quick action to stop this business disaster.

MS
09.08.2016
Cairo – Dubai