Despite local production wrapping up by the middle of this year, Nissan won’t be pulling the plug on its South African operations anytime soon.
NOT leaving
Last month, it announced that all of its assets, including the Rosslyn plant outside Pretoria, would become the property of Chery by mid-year.
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While this brings an end to 60 years of local Datsun and Nissan production, the Yokohama-headquartered marque will switch to become an importer, with three products coming to market this year.
New arrivals
Tekton
Debuting on 17 February, the first new arrival will be the Tekton based on the newly Indian-assembled Renault Duster.
So far only teased in a number of spy images, Tekton boasts Nissan specific styling and what is likely to be subtle change inside as a means of differentiating it from the Renault.
As with the Duster, though, the Tekton will be front-wheel drive only and have the same engine options.
These include a 1.0-litre turbo-petrol outputting 74kW/160Nm and a 1.3-litre turbo-petrol rated at 118kW/280Nm.
The final option combines a normally aspirated 1.8-litre petrol with a 1.4-kWh battery pack powering a pair of electric motors. Combined output is 118 kW.
Slotting in above the recently price dropped Magnite, the Tekton, effectively, serves as a replacement for the Qashqai dropped from Nissan South Africa’s line-up three years ago.
Patrol
Arriving later in the year, the long-awaited new Y63 Patrol will resume its rivalry with the Toyota Land Cruiser 300.
Although revealed two years ago, the focus on left-hand-drive markets, particularly the Middle East and North America where it is sold as the Armada, has been cited as the reason for the “delay” in right-hand-drive assembly.
Longer than the Y62 it replaces, the Y63 also drops the 5.6-litre V8 engine by reverting to an all six-cylinder engine line-up for the first time since the Y61.
In the Middle East, buyers have the choice of either a normally aspirated 3.8-litre V6 or the V8-replacing new 3.5-litre twin-turbo V6 that makes 317kW/700Nm. As with the Y62, no diesel is available.
Mystery third model
Finally, a third SUV will show itself either by year-end or in early-2027 based on the Renault Boreal.
The latter being a reworked version of the European-market Dacia Bigster, production will also take at the Chennai plant alongside the Magnite, Tekton and Duster.
While details are still unknown, Nissan has confirmed that the newcomer, known internally as the “three-row”, will have seven seats and slot-in between the Tekton and X-Trail instead of replacing the latter outright.
For the moment, no further details are known, however, expect more to emerge over the coming months.
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