A businessperson has claimed that an aide for Anwar Ibrahim was behind an “untrue” statement that was recently released by the Prime Minister's Office (PMO).

P Thiagarajan, who is a close acquaintance of Anwar, accused the prime minister’s special duties officer M Shanmugam of masterminding the PMO statement which denied Anwar would support the forming of a new party.

Thiagarajan claimed that Shanmugam had deliberately