Nik Abduh might have been smarter to have downgraded his transportation when making his visit to the MACC, although his superior morality might rightfully have considered that to be deceptive.

As it was he was photographed leaning out of a sleek black Mercedes as he spoke to journalists, who crowded around his exit asking what he had to say about money flowing from the corrupted former UMNO regime to PAS?

The image conflicted awkwardly with earlier claims by colleagues that PAS had dropped its London defamation case against Sarawak Report (who had raised concerns about those payments) because the party is allegedly too cash-strapped.

Couldn’t this senior party member so central to the case have simply flogged off this car to raise the necessary funds, rather than sending out the call for further contributions from hard up members as happened just last month?

Indeed, President Hadi Awang reiterated again that day that all the flush expenditure exhibited by the party, which included this case and contesting every seat at the last election, had been raised thanks to these very members.

He said there are a million such willing contributors (including the odd anonymous RM2.5 million payment of course).  However, those numbers are now substially depleted owing to the split in the party over these very issues: namely the growing friendship with UMNO and unexplained cash.

As media outlets explored the apparent reports currently being made to the MACC detailing further alleged lavish expenditures by senior PAS figures those remaining members must once again have wondered if it was fair to have asked them to fund the multi-million ringgit London litigation exercise in the first place? Litigation that has now come to naught.

However, by far the most astonishing revelation came when Nik Abduh repeated to those same reporters his earlier claim that the alleged recording of him telling PAS colleagues that millions of ringgit had indeed passed from UMNO to PAS (“UMNO are stupid”) was bogus. That evidence had been added by Sarawak Report to its defence.

Abduh told the reporters he had said as much to the investigators too when they had asked about it:

“I gave a brief answer – it (the recording) has nothing to do with me. I have answered this before, the recording is rubbish, slander,” he responded. [Malaysiakini]

Yet his boss, party President Hadi Awang, has signed a statement of truth to the UK court confirming the recording was indeed Nik Abduh, but explaining in considerable and contorted detail why Hadi did NOT think the recording was at all slanderous.

Since Nik Abduh was listed as one of Hadi’s proposed witnesses and was contradicting Hadi’s explanation for this key piece of evidence, it is not hard to fathom at least one reason behind PAS’s reluctance for the matter to come to court.

Just last week, no less than two known PAS officials finally went public to acknowledge that Nik Abduh did make those recorded statements about the UMNO cash in front of themselves and some 40 other PAS members.

One called the moment the darkest episode in his life.

Yet, here today was a smiling Nik Abduh leaning out of his Mercedes window and claiming once again it was all lies.