JM News UK

Senior members of Volkswagen's (VOWG_p.DE) supervisory board were prepared to demand Chairman Ferdinand Piech's resignation had he not agreed to a statement backing Chief Executive Martin Winterkorn, a German newspaper reported on Saturday. Citing sources on board, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung, said Piech, who sparked a leadership crisis at VW last week by openly criticising Winterkorn, had initially resisted pressure from other board members to back the CEO during an emergency meeting on Thursday. Volkswagen declined to comment on the report. The statement by the six-member executive committee of the board was seen as an unprecedented defeat for Piech, the powerful 78-year-old chairman and patriarch of the family that founded Volkswagen.