He denied it before he admitted it:
At the press conference [on March 12], Rodzali said:
“The RMAF has not ruled out the possibility of an air turn back on a reciprocal heading before the aircraft vanished from the radar and this resulted in the Search and Rescue Operations being widened to the vicinity of the waters off Penang.”
He denied it on March 9 misleading 14 nations into a wild fish chase in the South China Sea for 7 days, and then on March 12 he is caught in a big fat lie.
When told that other nations had evidence of the plane heading west, he cr&pped in his pants and has been backtracking ever since.
Yes, exactly — he denies that it headed west:
