Takata airbag report to be presented to attorney-general on Friday

A report documenting the findings of the committee formed to investigate the history of faulty airbags in Cyprus and their import into the country will be presented to Attorney-General George Savvides on Friday.

The legal service announced on Thursday that Savvides will take receipt of the report at 11am.

The committee was chaired by former Supreme Court judge Michalakis Christodoulou and was also made up of Bar Association chairman Michael Vorkas and audit office member Theodosios Hadjimichail.

For a little over two months, it conducted public hearings into the matter, interviewing numerous civil servants and ministers past and present.

The issue of airbags stems from the production of faulty airbags manufactured by Japanese company Takata. The company’s airbags suffer a fault related to exposure to high levels of heat or humidity, which means they have a tendency to explode when released under such circumstances.

This explosion shoots the airbag’s metal inflator outwards and in the direction of the person it was designed to protect, potentially causing further injuries or, in some cases, death.

Incumbent Transport Minister Alexis Vafeades had at the start of February decreed the recall of over 80,000 cars which are fitted with potentially fatal Takata airbags, all of which are to be replaced over a period of eight months.

Exactly 276 vehicles were immobilised immediately, and as such had their road tax and MOT certificates rescinded.

Owners of recalled vehicles that were not immobilised are allowed to continue using them but must book an appointment with the manufacturer’s Cyprus-based distributor within eight months to have the airbags replaced. Their road tax and MOT remain valid.

While the transport ministry recommends that affected drivers avoid using their vehicles and seek alternative transport, compliance is not mandatory and no fines will be issued for continued use.

Motorists can check whether their vehicles have been subject to vehicles on the transport ministry’s website.

After the committee’s final hearing last month, parents of people killed in car accidents due to faulty Takata airbags decried the “cheap excuses” offered by current and former state officials called to testify at the committee.

Yiannos Giorgallis, the father of Styliani Giorgalli, who was killed last October, was scathing of some state officials.

“We heard a lot from various people, such as ‘I did not see’, ‘I did not hear’, ‘I did not know’, ‘my predecessor did not inform me’, ‘my successor did not inform me’. For me, these are cheap excuses. If some other element is found that we did not hear and the committee manages to substantiate it, that is another matter,” he said.

He added that he is “confident” that responsibility for the matter will be correctly attributed by the report which is due to be presented on Friday, saying “the commission is trying to do a full and proper job”.

Meanwhile, Maria Loui, the mother of Kyriakos Oxinos, who was killed in January 2023, said that she and others had “witnessed logic up against absurdity” at the committee’s meetings.

“We are talking about state officials whose terms of office are supposed to be for the protection of the public. I, not as Kyriakos’ mother who experienced and is still experiencing that pain, but as a simple member of the public, with everything that was stated at the committee, find that this state does not protect its people,” she said.

“We heard directors of departments, permanent secretaries of ministers, ministers, and high-ranking police officers tell us, ‘I knew that I knew nothing’.”