His denial comes after a recording of the purported call between Zahid and Anwar went viral.

In a statement, Zahid said he had not been in any communication with Anwar after the Umno assembly, adding that the fake recording was a malicious political move to bring down his party.

He added that he has instructed his officer to lodge a police report to identify the culprit behind the recording.

“As Umno president, I would never violate or betray the decisions made by the Supreme Council and Umno general assembly,” he said.

Despite expressing surprise and disappointment at the fake recording, he said he expected to see more of such “dirty tricks” to try and “destroy” Umno.

In the recording, a man sounding like Anwar quipped that this was his first time following the assembly in 22 years, to which another man who sounded like Zahid said: “Don’t worry, that is only tactical.”

In his opening speech at the assembly on March 28, Zahid said Umno would be going it alone and contesting under the Barisan Nasional (BN) banner in the next general election (GE15). He added that the party’s Supreme Council had also decided on “No PPBM, no Anwar, no DAP”.

In the four-minute recording, “Anwar” praised Zahid’s speech and said he was “very proud” of him, while the pair also confirmed a meeting on Tuesday night that week.

Umno Supreme Council member Mohd Puad Zarkashi has already decried the recording as a “conspiracy of the highest level” and said the act of leaking it was politically motivated.

The party-hopping cluster (of MPs) and the recording of phone conversations exist because the government of the day doesn’t have a clear majority,” he said.

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