The South African Car of the Year, organised by the South African Guild of Motoring Journalists and sponsored by WesBank, is adjudicated by 26 local jury members.
The World Car of the Year is judged by 59 jury members from across the globe. In the case of both contests, all the jury members are leading motoring journalists.
This is the 24th South African Car of the Year, while the World Car of the Year was launched as recently as 2005.
Andrew Daniel, Managing Director of Jaguar Land Rover South Africa, says the XF's latest laurels are in keeping with its success since launch.
“It has won more than 30 commendations globally. Jaguar was one of only a handful of automotive brands to report a year-on-year sales increase in 2008 - we sold over 65,000 cars last year and increased sales by 8% over 2007. The XF played a substantial role in contributing towards this success,” he says.
The car has received awards from numerous highly respected publications including Top Gear, CAR magazine and The Sun motoring.
What Diesel and Auto Express voted the XF into their top spot by making it their Car of the Year last year. It was named the 2008 What Car? Car of the Year and it received the accolade for Best Executive Car for 2009 at the What Car? Awards.
The XF was named the Best Luxury Car and Best Diesel at the 2008 Scottish Car of the Year Awards and a panel of female judges also lauded the XF with the Best Executive Car Award in the evecars.com 2008 honours.
Now the big question is: can it win the South African Car of the Year and World Car of the Year contests?
The South African winner will be announced on 17 March 2009 at a banquet in Midrand, while the winner in the global stakes will be revealed on 9 April at the New York International Auto Show.
