A Renault-Nissan more equitable alliance was dealt a blow last month when a proposal to allow Renault to sidestep a French law that provides double-voting rights for the French government failed to win the two-thirds support it needed to pass.

This move is a defeat for the alliance’s chief Carlos Ghosn and keeps French government in tighter control of Renault.

When the alliance started in 1999, Renault was in a much stronger position and effectively rescued Nissan from bankruptcy.

This was reflected in the structure of cross-shares ownerships.

On paper, Renault controls Nissan through a 43.4 percent stake.

Nissan has no voting rights on its 15 percent cross-holding in Renault.

Under Ghosn, Nissan has outgrown its parent to account for two-thirds of combined vehicle sales and a bigger share of profit.

This should put it in the lead or at least on equal footing with Renault.

But, according to company insiders and French officials, the French government acted partly because it feared Renault’s “Nissanization” under a new convergence push by Ghosn.

Ghosn must now decide whether to fight or negotiate for closer Renault-Nissan integration in the face of France’s determination to keep Renault in control of the alliance.

Renault and Nissan both warned that the move would endanger their 16-year-old alliance just as global carmakers are increasingly competing on scale.

At Renault’s April 16 board meeting, Nissan also said any lasting increase in French government influence would prompt countermeasures, according to sources.

Ghosn is now trying to force the pace of integration by fusing production, purchasing and research and development under new alliance chiefs, all three of them Nissan managers. A Renault executive took a fourth post in human resources.

Such moves worried the Renault management and the French treasury prompting the assertion of Renault voting rights.

It seems that Ghosn would suffer resistance to his further integration plans because of an original fault-line in the alliance agreement.

This is explained by Louis Schweitzer, Ghosn’s former boss. “I built the Renault-Nissan alliance according to a logic in which Renault controlled Nissan,” said the top civil servant, who oversaw Renault’s 1996 privatization. It is now Ghosn’s move to regain some balance in this unusual alliance.

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*Adel Murad is a senior motoring and business journalist, based in London.

Email: [email protected]