News and headlines have been erupting in the past couple of days over what people are calling “The Volkswagen scandal“. Things haven’t been looking too good for the company since then, and now to further aid their downfall Switzerland has stopped the sales of diesel cars made by Volkswagen. The ban that would be enforced by the Swiss Federal Roads Office, would be on all Volkswagen group cars with diesel engines that contain the software designed to cheat pollution controls, which also include cars made by Audi, Skoda and Seat all of which Volkswagen owns.
The country has stopped the sale of any VW cars in the Euro5 emissions category, which contains the majority of the cars that the company has admitted have defeat devices. Thomas Rohrbach, spokesman for the Swiss federal office of roadways, said the move could potentially affect vehicles that have 1.2-litre, 1.6-litre and 2.0-litre diesel engines.
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Swiss officials estimated that around 180,000 vehicles built between 2004-2014 sold by the Volkswagen group contain this software and will be subject to recall, sales of new vehicles of this type would be completely banned in Switzerland. This ban will be a major blow to Volkswagen who has already lost about 50% of its stock value, US$7.27 billion has already been set aside by Volkswagen from its profits in order to accommodate for the recalls of the nearly 11 million vehicles affected, though fines opposed by the US government could be as high as US$ 18 billion.
New CEO Porsche chief Matthias Müller has taken over as head of the company and vows to gain back the trust that people had in the Volkswagen group.
“Under my leadership, Volkswagen will do everything it can to develop and implement the most stringent compliance and governance standards in our industry.”
Former CEO Martin Winterkorn resigned when the scandal first broke out. Ban does not include cars that have already been sold and are on the roads.
