I did not give son-in-law my blessing, Hadi says on ‘dedak cartel’ expose

PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang answering questions during a dialogue with the media in Kuala Lumpur today. On the left is party secretary-general Takiyuddin Hassan.

KUALA LUMPUR: PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang today denied giving his blessing to his son-in-law to expose the existence of a “dedak cartel” who had allegedly taken money from Umno.

Hadi said the claim by Zaharudin Muhammad was not true.

“The issue of me giving my blessing is not true and does not arise at all,” he told reporters after a meeting with the central party leadership.

Hadi said the top leadership had received a report on Zaharudin’s alleged breach of party discipline and he would be referred to PAS’ disciplinary committee.

On whether such an expose was good for PAS, Hadi said the “dedak cartel” issue was an old issue being played up again.

He said the case had already been resolved in court.

Zaharudin had revealed yesterday that Hadi had given him the go-ahead to expose the existence of the “dedak cartel”.

Zaharudin, who has since been ordered by the Islamist party to explain his allegation, also said that critics had tried to persuade Hadi to get him to withdraw his claims, which he had made on Facebook.

“They gave half-baked information claiming that I engaged in some friendly fire on Facebook. But in the end, I explained my reasons and Tok Guru (Hadi) gave his blessing and I have not retracted my claims,” he wrote on Facebook yesterday.

Zaharudin also said that a “bigger bomb” had been dropped – in the form of a “recording from Puchong” – an allusion to a 2016 audio recording about PAS receiving funds from Umno. - FMT