The government has denied paying ex-Apco Malaysia boss Paul Stadlen for his services, which allegedly include managing Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak's massive press operations.

 

"Up to now, the government did not provide any remuneration to Paul Stadlen," said Shahidan Kassim ( photo ), the minister in the Prime Minister's Department, in a written parliamentary reply dated May 19.

 

Mohamed Hanipa Maidin (PAS-Sepang) has asked the government to list the salary paid to Paul Stadlen as member of the communications team at the Prime Minister's Office.

 

Shahidan, however, did not deny that Stadlen is part of the communications team.

 

The government had paid a whopping RM77 million to controversial communications consultancy giant Apco Worldwide in 2009 to manage Malaysia's image internationally.

 

Stadlen has also worked with FBC Media after his role in Apco, a lobby group which was linked to a vicious online campaign against Anwar by the now discredited US blogger Josh Trevino and his company, Rogue Communications.

 

Speedy statement on Anwar

Whistle-blower Sarawak Report has alleged the PR expert was paid millions of ringgit to mastermind a communications policy which resulted in the PMO's speedy statement on PKR de facto leader Anwar Ibrahim's sodomy conviction on Feb 10.

DAP supremo Lim Kit Siang criticised the PMO's communications team, under Paul Stadlen, for moving so fast to defend the judgement even before the completion of the Federal Court judicial process.

Lim alleged that the PMO was privy to the outcome of the court's judgement.

The PMO replied saying they had prepared two versions of their statement to take into account both a 'guilty' and not 'guilty verdict'.