Saab 9-5 With a mind of it's own
 

Hello all,
This is a long one, and also my first post so any suggestions are welcome.
2mo I bought a 9-5 SportCombi with a 3.0t & auto trans, ran great for about 5k kilometers, until two weeks ago.
I was doing about 120km/h when I let off the accelerator to slow down for a corner, speed was dropping as usual, until about 85km/h when the engine just died on me. The electrics stayed on, but I was unable to steer it in any direction or brake as the pedal was really hard. Luckily nothing appeared on my path and I was able to stop safely. Tried turning the engine back on, but that lasted only for about 2 seconds, as it died again.. 3 tries later it finally stayed on and I was able to get home safely. Parked it, left overnight and the next morning it wouldn't start back up. It cranks fine, runs for about 3 seconds and just chokes itself. Dug through forums and figured it had to do with the MAF, unplugged it and it started just fine, runs and all. Ordered a replacement one, plugged it in to no luck, dies immediately after start. Unplugged and took it to a workshop, told me the car doesn't even detect the MAF, it's giving no signal (yet for some reason car doesn't behave as if it was unplugged) and got recommended to order a used but original MAF, did just that, but to no luck still dies after start.
Yesterday I've decided to plug my old MAF back in, but this time removed the plastic air pipe connecting it to the engine and wouldn't you know it - it starts every time and runs fine.
Could anyone share some knowledge on why this might be?