28 April 2023 April 2023 29
Fianna Fáil member, prolific Northern Ireland commentator,
coy possible Presidential candidate and Liar
BERTIE AHERN:
A
s you might have gathered from
recent and extensive media
coverage, Bertie Ahern was a busy
man in the lead-up to the Good
Friday Agreement of April 1998. He
was just over nine months into his rst term as
Taoiseach and had already faced some bruising
challenges. Not least was the forced resignation
of his rst Minister for Foreign Aairs, Ray Burke,
who reluctantly fell on his sword in October
1997 amid allegations of planning corruption.
Ahern appointed retired High Court judge,
Feargus Flood, to examine claims that Burke
had received large sums of money from
businessman, Joseph Murphy junior, of Joseph
Murphy Structural Engineers (JMSE) and
builder Michael Bailey during the 1989
general election campaign in return for
assistance with the re-zoning of lands in north
Dublin.
The allegation first emerged from interviews
in the Sunday Business Post between 1995
and 1997 which I did with former JMSE
chairman, Jim Gogarty. Further revelations of
widespread corruption in the planning system
then surfaced implicating, among others,
former Dublin assistant City and County
Manager, George Redmond. Months later,
By Frank Connolly
fresh allegations from developer Tom
Gilmartin dragged Pádraig Flynn, Liam Lawlor
and Frank Dunlop into the Tribunal’s inquiries.
By early 1999, as public hearings of the Flood
Tribunal commenced, Ahern was also brought
into the frame by Gilmartin.
By his own account, Ahern devoted much
energy during the early part of 1998 to
assisting US envoy, George Mitchell, in what
seemed intractable all-party negotiations in
the North as they approached the Easter
deadline for the talks in 1998.
He attended his mother’s funeral before
returning to Belfast to join Tony Blair in an
eleventh hour attempt to break the deadlock
over the major outstanding issues. These
included power-sharing, prisoner-releases
and the creation of significant and far-reaching
all island-bodies and institutions, including
the North South Ministerial Council (NSMC)
and the British and Irish Intergovernmental
Council (BIIGC).
Ahern told the RTÉ documentary, ‘The
Agreement’, in early April, 2023 that he would
not agree to the removal of Articles 2 and 3 of
the 1937 Irish Constitution (which claimed
sovereignty over the North) unless the NSMC
was accepted by Unionists. When he arrived
back in Belfast, he was told by Mitchell that
UUP leader, David Trimble, had thrown a
“hissy fit” over a joint British and Irish paper
proposing extensive North-South and inter-
governmental co-operation as part of a final
agreement.
In order to bolster Trimble, Ahern and Blair
agreed to dramatically reduce the number of
all-island bodies and the scale of North-South
co-operation which had been under discussion
After sending a fleet of
Ministerial limos to the first
NSMC meetings, Ahern did
little or nothing to promote
or build on the minimal
all-island bodies and co-
operation agreed in 1998
POLITICS
Presidentil?
28 April 2023 April 2023 29
between the two governments since their
predecessors, Albert Reynolds and John
Major, signed the ‘Downing Street Declaration’
five years earlier.
With Trimble under pressure from within his
own party and Ian Paisley stalking the grounds
of Stormont screaming “traitor” as the talks
came to a conclusion, the two governments,
with the help of US President Bill Clinton,
convinced the UUP and the other party leaders
to close the deal. It oered Nationalists a role
in government and a potential route to a
united Ireland while Unionists were
guaranteed their place in the UK until a
majority in the North and South decided
otherwise, through referendums.
Within two years, British Secretary of State
for Northern Ireland, Peter Mandelson,
unilaterally suspended the power-sharing
Executive as Trimble endured fresh turbulence
within his party. Jerey Donaldson and Arlene
Foster later jumped ship to the Democratic
Unionist Party (DUP) over what they considered
were too many concessions to republicans.
By 2006, Paisley had entered the power-
sharing government with Martin McGuinness,
and the RUC was dismantled and the IRA
decommissioned, formally ending its
campaign. Since then, successive British
governments have shored up Unionism
particularly when they needed DUP votes at
Westminster. Financial scandals surrounding
Peter Robinson and Arlene Foster led
McGuinness to bring down the Executive in
2017 for almost three years while Donaldson
has refused to work the power-sharing
institutions since Sinn Féin took the First
Minister position in May 2022.
After sending a fleet of Ministerial limos to
the first NSMC meetings, Ahern did little or
nothing to promote or build on the minimal all-
island bodies and co-operation agreed in
1998. The intergovernmental conference may
as well as never existed as it has rarely
convened since the GFA was signed.
The three-term Taoiseach instead
concentrated on forging ever deeper relations
between his party and property and financial
interests, promoting deregulation and using
the taxes flowing from real estate, fuelled by
cheap Eurozone banking credit, to stay in
power. He won elections in 2002 and 2007,
notwithstanding the embarrassing details
emerging from the Dublin Castle hearings
concerning his financial aairs.
In September 2002, Judge Flood produced
his explosive 150-page report into the
allegations against Burke and a raft of other
politicians across national and local
government. Ahern’s handler, P J Mara,
resigned in the wake of the report’s
publication, conveniently delayed until
months after the June election. Ahern
described the report as “profoundly
significant” and said: “It sends
out a clear message. Those who
acted improperly and illegally
while engaged in public life can
be assured that their actions will
be exposed.”.
Just days after the publication
of the report of the Tribunal, I
reported that the Taoiseach was
now accused, in a detailed
adavit provided by Gilmartin to
the planning inquiry, of taking
bribes totalling £80,000 in the
early 1990s from Cork developer,
Owen O’Callaghan. Ahern and
then justice minister, Michael
McDowell, publicly denounced
the report in the Ireland on
Sunday newspaper.
For the next three years, Ahern
spent much time ducking and
diving from the dicult questions
into his personal finances from the Planning
Tribunal, now chaired by Judge Alan Mahon,
including some about the acquisition of his
home, large unexplained Sterling lodgements
into bank accounts he controlled and one
explosive bank deposit of the exact equivalent
of $45,000, in December 1994. Many of these
unanswered questions were asked in stories
depicted on the last page of this article.
Following his resignation as Taoiseach in
2008, and from Fianna Fáil in 2012, after the
Tribunal’s final and damning report, Ahern
kept himself in the public eye until he was
welcomed back to the party earlier this year
just as the twenty-fifth anniversary of the GFA
came around. Now he will say anything that
he thinks people want to hear.
It is no harm to recall what we discovered
about Ahern’s finances during just a short
period of his political career, including during
the time he was a finance minister without a
bank account, between 1988 and 1994. Like
much about Bertie, it is simply hard to believe.
As the articles and images here from 2007
and 2008 reflect, Ahern was shown to have
misled the Mahon Tribunal over the sources of
large payments into various accounts under
his control but in the name of his daughters or
then partner Celia Ahern during 1993 and
1995. It was April 2007 before he conceded to
the Tribunal that he had been dealing in large
Sterling sums, much of it lodged in accounts
opened by Larkin during 1994. He claimed the
Sterling came from a collection by friends in
England following a football match in
Manchester in September that year. He
claimed “dig outs” by his mates in Dublin in
late 1993 and in 1994 were to help him get
through a rough patch following the break-up
of his marriage. His story was holed in the
water when accountant and chairman of the
Stock Exchange, Pádraic O’Connor, denied he
was involved in any such personal donation or
dig-out but that his stockbroker firm, NCB had
given £5000 to Fianna Fáil at the time.
“I never had a pint with Mr Ahern. I never
went to a football match with him. These are
things I do with my friends,”, said O’Connor.
Ahern refused to concede the lodgement by
Larkin, on 4 December 1994, of a sum of
£28,772.90 in the O’Connell Street branch of
AIB was the result of a $45,000 transaction.
The currency services operation manager at
the bank said it was “most probable” that the
lodgement was a result of such a Dollar
transaction given that it matched the exact
exchange rate on that day’s trading.
Instead, Ahern claimed that the money was
a result of a donation to his annual
constituency fundraiser by his landlord and
friend, Michael Wall. Wall said he had carried
Stg£30,000 in cash on the ferry to Dublin from
Manchester. He took Stg£2000 with him to
spend at the function in Kilmainham on 2
December, leaving the bulging suitcase in his
room in the Ashling hotel for the night. He then
took the remainder of the cash to Ahern’s
oce at St Luke’s in Drumcondra the following
day. Wall claimed that the money was made
available to Ahern to build a conservatory in
the large house he (Wall) owned o Grith
Avenue and which he intended to rent to his
close friend Ahern. He then told incredulous
Tribunal watchers that he later left the house
at 44 Beresford Avenue to Ahern in a will he
made out in July 1996 following a trac
accident in Manchester.
The Sterling and Dollar lodgements made
over a few months in late 1994 amounted to
more than £80,000 which was almost twice
Ahern’s pre-tax salary as finance minister.
Removing any possible doubt that the
accounts she opened were for Ahern’s benefit,
Larkin recalled how she was driven by Ahern,
Ahern conceded to the Tribunal that he had been dealing in
large Sterling sums, much of it lodged in accounts opened
by Larkin during 1994
30 April 2023 April 2023 31
then leader of the opposition, in January 1995,
to the AIB in O’Connell Street in order to
withdraw £50,000 in cash.
Asked by a Tribunal lawyer why she withdrew
the money in cash, Larkin said, to laughter
from the audience in Dublin Castle: “Bertie
dealt in cash; I think he felt more comfortable
with it”.
In an extensive interview in The Irish Times
on Saturday 8 April last, Ahern claimed that
his banking expert, Paddy Stronge, had
provided documentation which “was
consistent with the composition of the dollar
lodgement as being largely made up of
sterling, with some additional Irish pounds.”.
He complained to the newspaper that Stronge
had not been invited to give evidence to the
Tribunal. However, it was also the case that
Ahern had successfully claimed legal privilege
over 150 documents relating to Stronge’s
financial analysis and had refused to provide
them to the Tribunal.
Further, Ahern was not asked during his
Irish Times interview about correspondence
he had in the weeks preceding the disputed
Dollar lodgement, with a broker in Los Angeles
whom the then finance minister had assisted
with a planned football stadium project on
land owned by developer Owen O’Callaghan
at Neilstown in Clondalkin, west Dublin.
O’Callaghan, it transpired, did not trust
Ahern to do his bidding despite taking money
from the developer, according to evidence by
Eamon Dunphy to the Tribunal. The former
footballer had worked with O’Callaghan in the
mid-1990s on a schene to base London
football club, Wimbledon FC, at the proposed
Neilstown stadium.
According to Dunphy, O’Callaghan complained
that Ahern was slow to deliver on promises he
made, even when he was “looked after”.
Quoting O’Callaghan, Dunphy said: “The
thing about Bertie is that he takes the money
and he doesn’t do the business.”. Dunphy also
claimed that money was paid by O’Callaghan
to Ahern in respect of a tax designation granted
for land owned by the Cork developer at Golden
Island in Athlone in 1994.
“He (O’Callaghan) told me a story over a
meal about Bertie, when Albert (Reynolds)
had to put a gun to his head to get tax
designation for (Golden Island)”, on the night
before the collapse of the Fianna Fáil-Labour
coalition in December 1994. The Tribunal
confirmed that Ahern signed a ministerial
order on 14 December, 1994 granting
designation to O’Callaghan’s site — the day
before the dissolution of the Dáil.
The collapse of that government just three
months after the IRA ceasefire was, in part, a
consequence of Ahern’s desperate ambition
to replace Albert Reynolds as Taoiseach, no
matter what the implications were for the
delicate negotiations between the two
governments that eventually led to the Good
Friday Agreement.
As the general election of 2007 approached
Ahern was on the ropes over the plethora of lies
he had invented to explain his convoluted
finances.
Six months after he left
office, the property bubble
burst and the economy
collapsed following
a decade of financial
mismanagement under
his watch. Lest we forget
His explanations of the dig-outs, the gift of
a house from his landlord and Sterling
amounts that he ‘won on the horses’ were
roundly dismissed as rubbish. In early 2008,
I revealed that the Taoiseach did not hold a tax
clearance certificate and had misled the
public about his dealings with the Revenue
Commissioners. Ahern announced his
resignation as Taoiseach and Fianna Fáil
leader on 2 April, 2008.
As he travelled to the US in April 2008 to
address a Joint Session of Congress during his
last lap of glory, Ahern left his hapless
secretary to face the Tribunal over unusual
sterling lodgements she made on his behalf
to a building society account in the names of
his daughters.
After hours of questioning, Gráinne Carruth
broke down in the witness box.
“I just want to go home”, she cried.
Six months after he left office, the
property bubble burst and the economy
collapsed following a decade of financial
mismanagement under his watch. Lest we
forget.
Crruth: in ters fter
evidence bout Ahern
The economy collpsed 6 months fter Ahern left office
“I just want to
go home”, cried
Ahern’s Secretary
under pressure
from the Tribunal
over Sterling
lodgements by
Ahern
30 April 2023 April 2023 31
that several lodgments by Mr Ahern
and his then girlfriend, Celia Larkin,
between 1993 and 1995 equated to
large sterling and dollar amounts.
Mr Murphy’s testimony will be
heard in public early next month,
when the tribunal will be taking evi-
dence concerning Mr Ahern’s per-
sonal finances.
Three other AIB officials, as well as
Miss Larkin and Manchester busi-
nessman Michael Wall, have also been
called to give evidence in hearings
EXCLUSIVE:
KATE IS DATING
WILLS AGAIN
● See Page 3
Price: ¤2.00 (£1.00 NI)
SV1
A SENIOR OFFICIAL in AIB
has told the Mahon Tribunal
that he personally handled
large cash lodgments from
Bertie Ahern between 1993
and 1995.
But, the Irish Mail on Sunday can
today reveal, he claims he cannot
remember if any of them involved
foreign exchange transactions.
Philip Murphy, an assistant manager
with AIB, described in an interview
with the tribunal in April of this year
June 24, 2007
TURN TO PAGES EIGHT
BERTIE’S
BANKER
BREAKS
SILENCE
EXCLUSIV E:
What top AIB official will
tell Mahon about Taoiseach’s finances
SPORTS
TWO GREAT FREE
PULLOUTS INSIDE
PULLOUTS INSIDE
SPORTS
PLUS FREE FITNESS DVD WORTH E25 FOR EVERY READER
SEE
DETAILS
PAGE 42
how he acted as a personal banker for
Mr Ahern.
Mr Ahern was finance minister
between 1992 and 1994. Mr Murphy’s
services for him during that period
and after involved collecting large
quantities of cash in the politician’s
constituency office in Drumcondra.
In an extraordinary interview with
Mahon Tribunal lawyers, Mr Murphy
described as a ‘coincidence’ the fact
EXCLUSIVE
By Frank Connolly
TWO GREAT FREE
TAOISEACH Bertie Ahern lied about his tax
affairs – not only to the Dáil but to the voters
in the middle of this year’s general election.
There can be no other rational interpretation
of a damning series of letters between Mr
Ahern and the Revenue Commissioners, details
of which are exclusively revealed today by the
Irish Mail on Sunday.
One thing is certain – the taxmen certainly do not
believe him.
This bombshell revelation is as big a blow to the
Taoiseach’s credibility as anything that has so far
emerged at the Mahon Tribunal.
It also means that he is now, for the first time,
fighting for his political survival on two fronts – the
tribunal and the Revenue Commissioners.
Last night, an Opposition spokesman bluntly
Continued on Pages 6-7
EXCLUSIVE
SEE PAGE 9
TESTS SHOW
THE LETHAL
COCKTAIL OF
DRUGS THAT
KILLED KATY
DECEMBER 30, 2007
¤2.00
(£1.00NI)
IRELAND ON SUNDAY
INCORPORATING
FREE EYE GEL FOR EVERY READER
FREE EYE GEL FOR EVERY READER
WORTH OVER
¤ 14
WORTH OVER
¤ 14
SEE PAGE 79
SEE PAGE 79
accused the Taoiseach of attempting to hide behind
‘a tissue of lies’.
In the lengthy correspondence, which has been
ongoing since October of last year, Mr Ahern is
effectively accused of:
● Misleading the Dáil and the Irish people when he
claimed last year to have settled his bizarre per-
sonal financial affairs with the tax authorities.
● Misleading the public in the middle of the general
election campaign when he claimed he had almost
completed his discussions with the Revenue
PHILIP NOLAN REPORTS: SEE PAGES 4-5
By Frank Connolly
THE REPORTER WHO BROKE BERTIEGATE
EXCLUSIVE
REVEALED:
BERTIE LIES
A BOUT TA X
REVEALED:
BERTIE LIES
A BOUT TA X
From thepaper that broke Bertiegate, the damning
lettersthat prove Revenue doesn’t believe Mr Ahern
GOODBYE JOE
GOODBYE JOE
Laughter, tears and tributes as stars
and fans in theirthousands give
singing legend his last full house
Laughter, tears and tributes as stars
and fans in theirthousands give
singing legend his last full house
Price: ¤2.00 (£1.00 NI)
SV1
IT’S the glaring contradiction
that last night looked like costing
Taoiseach Bertie Ahern his job.
All week, Mr Ahern and his support-
ers have insisted that a controversial
£30,000 payment from businessman
Michael Wall was to his former partner,
Celia Larkin.
But, the Irish Mail on Sunday can today
May 6, 2007
By Frank Connolly
TURN TO PAGE 2
EXPOSED:
BERTIE
’
S
BIG LIE
Explosivetribunal
testimony– in full
See Pages 4- 7
Exclusive: Both Ahern and Wall told
Mahon £30,000 was for HIM, not Celia
★ Red Red Wine ★ Can’t Help Falling In Love ★ One In Ten
★ Food For Thought ★ Cherry Oh Baby ★ Present Arms
★ If It Happens Again ★ Tyler ★ Rat In Mi Kitchen
★ Kingston Town ★ Homely Girl ★ Bring Me Your Cup
★ King ★ Higher Ground ★ Sing Our Own Song
★ Red Red Wine ★ Can’t Help Falling In Love ★ One In Ten
★ Food For Thought ★ Cherry Oh Baby ★ Present Arms
★ If It Happens Again ★ Tyler ★ Rat In Mi Kitchen
★ Kingston Town ★ Homely Girl ★ Bring Me Your Cup
★ King ★ Higher Ground ★ Sing Our Own Song
INCLUDING
THE NO 1 HITS,
CAN’T HELP
FALLING IN
LOVE AND RED
RED WINE
INCLUDING
THE NO 1 HITS,
CAN’T HELP
FALLING IN
LOVE AND RED
RED WINE
★
15-TRACK
COLLECTOR’S
EDITION
FEATURING...
15-TRACK
COLLECTOR’S
EDITION
FEATURING...
FREE CDINSIDE
FREE CDINSIDE
reveal, this claim is contradicted by Mr
Ahern’s own direct evidence to the Mahon
Tribunal last month.
It is also contradicted in an interview given
by Mr Wall to the tribunal on March 5 last.
Their testimony not only flies in the face of
Mr Ahern’s repeated assertions this week
The embattled Taoiseach in Co. Clare yesterday
Spanish
phrase book
&
dictionary
Price: ¤2.00 (£1.00 NI)
SV1
MYSTERY LAST night sur-
rounded a series of substantial
payments, totalling almost
E180,000, that appear to have
been made by Taoiseach Bertie
Ahern over the past eight years.
Information supplied to the Mahon
Tribunal by Mr Ahern’s own legal
advisers suggests that the money was
handed over, in five separate pay-
ments, to Mr Ahern’s former girl-
friend, Celia Larkin.
Documentation now in the possession
May 20, 2007
TURN TO PAGE FIVE
BERTIE’S
180
,
000
PAYO U T S
MYSTERY
Baby delight
for Tatianna
● See Pages 24-25
Letter from his solicitor suggests they went to
ex-girlfriend Celia Larkin – with gift tax paid
EXCLUSIVE
By Frank Connolly
of tribunal investigators also indicates
that, as well as giving Miss Larkin the
money, Mr Ahern paid her full tax liability.
The most recent payment – just over
E30,000 – was made in May 2006. Three of
the five payments were made since Mr
Ahern and Miss Larkin separated.
Details of the payments were disclosed
after the tribunal threatened to seek
details of Mr Ahern’s tax affairs from the
Revenue Commissioners. Last night, a
spokesman for Mr Ahern would say only
that no such matter was under investiga-
tion by the tribunal. Miss Larkin was not
available for comment.
But legal sources have confirmed that
details of the payments are contained in a
letter sent to the tribunal on February 27
by Mr Ahern’s solicitors, Frank Ward & Co.
By an extraordinary coincidence, the
total sum of money involved equates
almost exactly to IR£138,000 – the price
Manchester businessman Michael Ward
paid for Mr Ahern’s house in 1995.
What appear to be sizeable, tax-free
TERMS AND CONDITIONS APPLY
Spanish
phrase book
&
dictionary
forevery reader
forevery reader
FREE
FREE
HOLIDAY TREATS
HOLIDAY TREATS
SEE TV
WEEK
PAGE 24
SEE TV
WEEK
PAGE 24
PLUS W150 OFF PANORAMA HOLIDAY
PLUS W150 OFF PANORAMA HOLIDAY
SEE
PAGE 64
SEE
PAGE 64
0
worth
over
¤20
Price: ¤2.00 (£1.00 NI)
V1
A SECOND key witness in the
Sophie Toscan du Plantier mur-
der investigation has withdrawn
statements implicating prime
suspect Ian Bailey.
Retired garage owner Paddy Lowney
has confirmed he no longer stands
over statements taken from him by
gardaí.
Mr Lowney, 60, signed statements nam-
ing Bailey as the man who came to his pri-
May 13, 2007
TURN TO PAGE FOUR
SOPHIE:
SECOND
WITNESS
RETRACTS
Is Katy dating
a tycoon’s son?
● SEE PAGE THREE
See Pages 14-15
See
Page
54
The American banker,
a grandiose dream and
the $45,000 question
that’s haunting Bertie
WIN A GLORIOUS HOLIDAY HOME WORTH ¤600,000
New concerns over inquiry as we reveal victim’s
secret lover and depraved diaries kept by
suspect
EXCLUSIVE
By Shane Phelan
vate photo lab to develop suspicious pho-
tographs showing a woman lying on the
ground on a stony roadway.
The woman in the photos was in much
the same position in which Sophie’s badly
beaten body was found outside her west
Cork holiday home.
The glamorous 39-year-old French film-
maker was bludgeoned to death in
December 1996 and her killer has never
been brought to justice.
But Mr Lowney has now withdrawn the
statements, claiming that while a man did
come to him with suspicious photos, he
never identified that man to gardaí as
being Ian Bailey.
‘I didn’t actually say it was him,’ said Mr
Lowney.
The bombshell is just one of an aston-
ishing series of new revelations about the
Irish Mail on Sunday,
April 1, 2007 Page 23
v1
Bertie Bowl Mark I
How Ahern flew to Los Angeles to help secure
finance for a new Dublin stadium – even though
its promoters (Liam Lawlor and Frank Dunlop)
didn’t own the land where it was to be built...
BERTIE AHERN helped a
consortium to get financing
for an ambitious sports sta-
dium project in Dublin – even
though its promoters, includ-
ing disgraced lobbyist Frank
Dunlop and the late Liam
Lawlor, did not own the land
where it was to be located.
In March 1994, Mr Ahern, who was
then finance minister, visited an
investment brokers in Los Angeles
to help promote the all-purpose
national stadium project even
though it was planned without the
knowledge of a key owner of the
lands.
Mr Ahern was in California at the
taxpayer’s expense. He reviewed
the annual St Patrick’s Day parades
in Los Angeles and San Diego and
attended a series of meetings with
Irish-American cultural and busi-
ness organisations, he told the Dáil
in answer to a written parliamen-
tary question later that year.
He was, he told Fine Gael TD
Bernard Durkan, accompanied by
three civil servants – his private sec-
retary, press officer and personal
assistant. The estimated cost of the
trip, including four scheduled
flights, was £23,000.
Following last Friday’s Supreme
Court judgment allowing the
Mahon Tribunal to proceed with
public hearings into the Quarryvale
2 module, Mr Ahern and his prede-
cessor as Fianna Fáil leader, Albert
Reynolds, will be called to explain
their role in the stadium venture.
The tribunal is currently investi-
gating, in private, the disposal of
land by Dublin Co. Council for the
site of a proposed national stadium
which was to be run by a company
involving Messrs Dunlop, Lawlor,
architect Ambrose Kelly and Cork
developer Owen O’Callaghan.
The ambitious project had the
enthusiastic backing of Mr Ahern
and then-taoiseach Mr Reynolds.
Both visited the LA investment bro-
ker to help raise finance for it.
The government also offered the
consortium an annual subvention of
£5m, a favourable tax designation
and money from the National Lot-
tery as well as providing assurance
of top-level government support to
prospective financiers in the United
States. The tribunal is seeking to
establish whether there was politi-
cal influence in the disposal of State
lands to the promoters.
In February 1994, Dublin Corpora-
tion agreed to dispose of 28 acres at
Balgaddy, Clondalkin, to Merry-
grove Ltd to provide for additional
car parking for the proposed new
stadium on an adjoining site. The
land was sold for £1,120,000 or
£40,000 per acre in an area which
Ahern and Reynolds
backed the project
Bertie Ahern, right, shaking hands with Frank Dunlop, who was involved with Liam Lawlor, left
had previously been earmarked for
a town centre.
The tribunal has heard that it was
sold at a price considered by senior
council officials to be less than its
value and after the intervention of
central government.
Planning permission had already
been obtained, in August 1993, by a
company called Leisure Ireland Ltd
for a 40,000 seat national stadium
which was to be built at a cost of
£60m on the adjoining 33-acre site
owned by Merrygrove.
Elaborate plans and costings for
the stadium were prepared and
Messrs Reynolds and Ahern had
indicated to the developers that the
government could provide £5m per
year for the project as well as tax
designation on the site and a share
of the lottery money allocated to
sports.
What the politicians perhaps did
not realise was that the land did not
belong to the men behind the pro-
ject, including Messrs Dunlop, Kelly
and Lawlor but, in fact, belonged to
Barkhill, a company in which Tom
Gilmartin was co-owner along with
Owen O’Callaghan and Allied Irish
Bank.
The lands were owned by Merry-
grove Ltd which, in turn, was a sub-
sidiary of Barkhill Ltd, the company
formed by Mr Gilmartin to develop
the Quarryvale, now Liffey Valley,
retail centre in west Dublin.
Mr Gilmartin held 40pc of the
shares in Barkhill while Mr
O’Callaghan owned 40pc with AIB
holding the balance of 20pc.
The tribunal has recently been
told that Mr Gilmartin was not
aware that the lands at Balgaddy,
which he had purchased, were
being touted to the government
and to US financiers for a national
stadium. He says he was not
informed by his co-directors in
Barkhill, of which Merrygrove was
a subsidiary, that they were actively
pursuing the stadium project since
1992.
Neither was he informed that the
entire 61 acres of land at Clondalkin
in the possession of Merrygrove was
to be transferred to Leisure Ireland
Ltd. Leisure Ireland, subsequently
renamed Leisure West Ltd, listed
among its shareholders Messrs
Dunlop, Kelly and O’Callaghan,
while Mr Lawlor’s equal 25pc
shareholding was to be held in
trust.
Mr Gilmartin has told the tribunal
that he was not informed at board
meetings held in AIB’s Ballsbridge
bank centre that Messrs Lawlor
and Dunlop were actively engaged
in the stadium project involving his
lands. He claims that the purchase
of the additional lands from Dublin
Corporation was made without his
knowledge and the planned sale of
Merrygrove to Leisure West was
carried out unknown to the then
Luton-based developer.
He has previously said that he
considered Mr Lawlor a ‘gangster’
and had described Mr Dunlop as a
‘bag man’ and said that he did not
want either man involved in his
business activities. Mr Dunlop’s
company, Shefran Ltd, was paid
hundreds of thousands of pounds
by Barkhill without Mr Gilmartin’s
knowledge.
The tribunal is seeking to estab-
lish where more than £1.5m of
Barkhill funds went amid allega-
tions that they were used to bribe
both senior and local politicians in
the late ’80s and early ’90s.
The tribunal is expected to re-
open public hearings into the Quar-
ryvale 2 module in the coming
weeks but will suspend them for
two weeks leading up to the general
election, expected in May. Messrs
Ahern and Reynolds, as well as
other prominent political and busi-
ness figures, will be called to give
evidence although it is unlikely they
will appear before the election.
Documents seen by the Irish Mail
on Sunday indicate that up to
£0.5m of Barkhill funds were used
on the stadium project, including
large payments to Messrs Dunlop,
Lawlor and Kelly for services pro-
vided.
Mr Gilmartin has complained that
he is the victim of a massive fraud
carried out by influential business
and political interests who hijacked
his multimillion-euro Quarryvale
project. Now it is alleged that pub-
lic lands were sold under political
pressure to assist people develop a
stadium on lands they did not own.
The late Liam Lawlor came up
with the idea for a stadium as an
alternative use for the site, which
had been chosen as the location of
a town centre for the people of
Clondalkin and Neilstown as far
back as the mid ’70s.
In the late ’80s, Mr Gilmartin had
acquired substantial lands at
nearby Quarryvale at the junction
of the N4 and M50 and it was clear
that it was a far more commercially
viable location for a retail centre
and business park.
Mr O’Callaghan used his option to
purchase the Balgaddy lands from
the corporation as leverage to force
Mr Gilmartin to give him a stake in
the lucrative Quarryvale develop-
ment. In order to convince local res-
idents and political representatives
in Clondalkin that they should
agree to rezone the lands at Quar-
ryvale for a town centre, an alterna-
tive use for the Balgaddy lands was
required.
Despite the elaborate plans for
the national stadium project,
including discussions with the
Football Association of Ireland to
use it as its official home, the
scheme never got off the ground.
In the mid ’90s, Mr O’Callaghan
engaged sporting contacts includ-
ing Joe Kinnear and Eamon Dun-
phy to try to attract the then promi-
nent English Premier League club,
Wimbledon, to relocate to the
grounds and bring English soccer to
Dublin. Their efforts were unsuc-
cessful after Wimbledon was bought
out by a Norwegian consortium.
SPECIAL
REPORT
By Frank
Connolly
Gilmartin unaware
lands were touted
Evidence unlikely
before election
Page 4
Irish Mail on Sunday,
May 6, 2007
v1
Celia’s battle to balance the books
Finance minister
IN INTIMATE AND FASCINATING DETAIL,
BERTIE AHERN always
cashed his salary cheques,
paid his bills in cash, didn’t
write cheques and never
used a credit card, his former
girlfriend, Celia Larkin, has
told the Mahon Tribunal.
During their 15-year relationship,
Mr Ahern served variously as
finance minister, leader of the
opposition and then as taoiseach.
Miss Larkin said she had very lit-
tle involvement in or knowledge of
his financial affairs.
Explaining that she had main-
tained her own home throughout
their relationship, Miss Larkin said:
‘Bertie always dealt in cash. When
he went anywhere, he paid for
things in cash. So I never ques-
tioned anything.’
She was unaware that, at one
time, he did not have a bank
account.
‘There was no reason to know. I
mean, I know that he dealt in cash,
I knew that he didn’t use credit
cards, I knew that he didn’t write
cheques, but that was all.’
She insisted that they never dis-
cussed the details of his legal sepa-
ration from his wife, Miriam.
‘I didn’t ask him, really – you don’t
ask people things like that.
‘We never sat down and talked
about if, if you know what I mean.
But I did know that he had, he had
substantial bills from the court
hearings. But that would be evi-
dent from the fact that it went to
the High Court anyway.’
The only occasion on which she
became involved in Mr Ahern’s
financial affairs, she said, was when
he moved into the house on Beres-
ford Avenue, Drumcondra, owned
by Michael Wall.
‘I was able to sign cheques for
him. It was his account. It wasn’t a
joint account. That would have
paid for domestic bills if they came
in if he wasn’t available.’
While working as a civil servant in
Mr Ahern’s constituency office, she
had never known that he kept
money in the safe in his office. Nor
did she ever see any substantial
sums in his ministerial office.
On only one occasion prior to the
purchase by Mr Wall of the house,
did she get involved in Mr Ahern’s
financial affairs.
‘After the separation, he was
thinking of buying a home of his
own. I remember there was a de-
posit put on a house in Castleknock,
a £2,000 deposit at that time which
had to go down and he was away.
And I think I wrote a cheque for
that… which he reimbursed me. But
he never went ahead with the pur-
chase and the money came back.’
At the end of 1993, just after his
marital separation had been com-
pleted, Mr Ahern opened a bank
account in AIB on O’Connell Street,
where Miss Larkin had herself
maintained an account since 1987.
Initially, this was a loan account.
But Miss Larkin said she was
unaware that Mr Ahern had taken
out a loan. Nor did she remember
discussing with him his opening of
a savings account in the same bank
on December 30, 1993.
Miss Larkin said she hadn’t ‘a
clue, not a clue’ where the £22,500
SHE DRIVES a e50,000 Mercedes, regularly
indulges a penchant for e10,000 Hermes
Birkin handbags, and chooses her work
clothes from a rail of haute couture hanging
in her wardrobe. It is in keeping with her
career as a beauty consultant.
But the personal finances of the Taoiseach’s
former partner, Celia Larkin, are in stark con-
trast to her extravagant lifestyle.
Since acquiring a four-bedroom, e500,000
home in Castleknock, north Dublin, shortly
after her 40th birthday in 1999, Miss Larkin
has taken out four separate mortgages on the
house. She took out the first mortgage with
Irish Nationwide Building Society on Septem-
ber 3, 1999.
Six months later, on March 1, 2000, shetook
out a second mortgage with the building soci-
ety. Documents at the Registry of Deeds show
‘Wouldn’t take £28k
and go to Switzers’
Bertiegate: In their own words
opening balance that Mr Ahern
then lodged in that account came
from. Later, there was a lodgment
of £27,164 which, with interest,
brought the total in the account up
to the maximum allowable £50,000.
Miss Larkin conceded that it was
she who, a year later, withdrew all
of this money – in two separate
withdrawals of £28,000 and £22,000
– and used it to open a new account
in her own name.
This was the account she then
used to pay bills connected with
the renovation of Mr Ahern’s house.
‘At that time… there was contro-
versy around whether if he was
elected, I think when the contest
happened between Albert and him-
self for leader and the famous quote
that “we like to know where our
leader sleeps”. So the point of hav-
ing a home of his own arose, that
was specifically his that it could be
identified rather than staying with
his mother or staying in St Luke’s,
as he had. So that’s when the issues
of an account arose and that’s
when I was asked to assist.’
Miss Larkin said she opened two
accounts in her own name. Into one
of them, she lodged the £50,000
that had been withdrawn from Mr
Ahern’s savings account, and into
the other – ‘what I would call “the
Michael Wall account”’ – she lodged
£28,000 which had been handed
over by Mr Wall.
‘Because the two people were
buying – well, Michael Wall was buy-
ing the house and Bertie was rent-
ing it and he subsequently bought
the house from Michael Wall – it was
an agreement between them.’
The ‘Michael Wall account’, she
said, was to be used for structural
work on the house, ‘which was the
conservatory and that and stamp
duty and things like that for the
house’. The other account, ‘the
Bertie account’, was to be for ‘dec-
oration and furnishings and soft
furnishings and things like that’.
‘And then, because we were going
to do it in piecemeal, as in, you
know, buy curtains and to do this,
that and the other, we took the
money out to hold it in cash. At
that point, I think the cash may
have been kept in St Luke’s.
‘In the meantime, the Michael
Wall account was operating where
we had this stamp duty, which was
in May to be paid for the house.
Because, remember, Michael Wall
bought the house in his own name.
‘Then there was the conservatory,
which was about £11,000, I think.
And there was various other bits
and bobs.’
Miss Larkin could offer no expla-
nation of why Mr Ahern was pre-
pared to suffer a loss of interest in
moving his money from the high
interest savings account.
‘My understanding of dealing with
that money is that it was put into
an account in my name, and I dealt
with it at that stage. I then took it
out of that and gave it back to
Bertie. Anything I did on this would
have been on his instruction.
‘I wouldn’t have instigated a with-
drawal on his account on my
behalf. I wouldn’t have gone in and
taken £28,000 out of his account
and gone into Switzers.’
But a month later, the £50,000 was
taken out of the account in cash
and given to Mr Ahern.
‘The general idea was that you
have more ready access to it.
‘Bertie dealt in cash. I think he
felt more comfortable with it.’
The arrangement arrived at
whereby Mr Wall bought the house
was a ‘safety net’, she said.
‘Michael wanted to come over to
Dublin – he came over to Dublin
and to Mayo quite a lot. And he
said he wanted to have a house in
Dublin he could stay in but that he
would also rent to Bertie and Bertie
could buy back from him.
‘I have to say, my view at that
time is that Bertie should have
bought a house himself.
‘But Bertie did rent the house
from him and then Michael had a
very serious accident and Bertie
having put 50 or whatever of his
money into the house and there
was nothing to say that he had any
call on the house, save he was rent-
ing it. So I think that hastened the
process of Bertie buying it.’
Miss Larkin said that, in paying
for work on the house at Beresford,
she withdrew cash and used this to
purchase bank drafts.
Miss Larkin denied she had ever
received cash from the AIB on
O’Connell Street for anybody other
than Mr Ahern or that she was ever
asked to collect a package of
money from the bank branch.
Celia Larkin’s
testimony
‘Bertie should have
bought a house’
By Frank Connolly
By Valerie Hanley
Ahern and
Celia Larkin
were a
couple for
15 years
that, on July 23, 2003, the beauty consultant
got a third mortgage on the house and took a
a fourth in December 2005.
According to records held at the Registry of
Deeds, Miss Larkin has not yet cleared any of
the four mortgages.
Despite this, Miss Larkin still feels finan-
cially confident enough to add to her property
portfolio. According to close friends, she plans
to build a luxury home on a riverside site in
the picturesque village of Killaloe in Clare, as
well as purchasing a holiday home in the Ital-
ian millionaire’s paradise of Tuscany.
Meanwhile, records in the Companies Office
show that the success of her beauty business,
which she set up in 2001, has been modest. Her
two salons in Dublin and Limerick, Beauty at
Blue Door, are making modest returns.
By the end of 2002 the company had accu-
mulated losses of e48,597. Three years later,
these losses were virtually unchanged at
e45,620.
According to financial experts, these figures
suggest that after the startup losses, Beauty at
Blue Door has been making at least some
money ever since.
The accumulated profit-and-loss figures con-
tained in accounts filed with the Companies
Office are the margins which a business earns
after taxes and dividends have been paid.
The accounts for Beauty at Blue Door show
that the company has been gradually reduc-
ing what its owes to creditors. At the end of
2003, it owed a total of e118,000. By the end of
2005, this figure had been reduced to e97,000.
I felt I was putting it into
good hands. I didn’t feel
they ’d run away with it
who only paid cash
WHAT MANCHESTER BUSINESSMAN AND TAOISEACH’S EX TOLD TRIBUNAL
Irish Mail on Sunday,
May 6, 2007 Page 5
v1
MICHAEL WALL has told tri-
bunal lawyers that he gave
about stg£30,000 in cash to
Bertie Ahern at a pre-arranged
meeting in Mr Ahern’s con-
stituency office on December
3, 1994.
The Manchester businessman is a
friend of Mr Ahern.
Remarkably, the money – which Mr
Wall says was to pay for renovation
work on the house at Beresford
Avenue that he subsequently bought
for £138,000 and rented to Mr Ahern
– was not counted out. Nor did Mr
Wall ask for or receive a receipt.
‘At the time, I felt I was putting it in
good hands. I didn’t feel they were
going to run away with it.’
All the money was subsequently
spent with the exception of stg£3,000,
he said. But he never received an
invoice for any of this expenditure.
Asked whether he believed it was
spent on the property, he said: ‘I have
no idea and I don’t want to know.’
Asked specifically whether he
thought it was Mr Ahern or Miss
Larkin who received the money
from him, he replied: ‘Well, Mr
Ahern received it.’
Miss Larkin was also at the
meeting, ‘to the best of my
knowledge’, he added. ‘It was sug-
gested by Celia and Bertie that we
put it into an account until it was
needed.’
Mr Wall said he had no idea at the
time that IR£50,000 of Mr Ahern’s
money had simultaneously been
placed in another bank account
opened by Miss Larkin, which Mr
Ahern and Miss Larkin say was also
to be spent on doing up the Drum-
condra house.
He found out about this second
account only when told about it in
September or October of last year.
Mr Wall said he was not sure pre-
cisely how much money he handed
over: ‘At the time, the figure I had in
my mind was around £30,000 ster-
ling,’ he told the lawyers.
In fact, the sum lodged by Miss
Larkin on the following Monday in
what she called ‘the Michael Wall
account’ was stg£28,782.
Mr Wall said this money was to pay
for ‘the conservatory and all that
stuff’, even though his purchase of
the house had not yet been closed.
‘I was positive that everything was
going through. And if anything did
happen, well, then the money
wouldn’t have to be expended. I
wasn’t spending money as such at
that point, because the money was
made available for the work and I
didn’t know how long it was going to
take to complete or whatever at that
particular time.’
He chose to hand the money over
in cash, because ‘I am a guy who has
dealt with cash, a hell of a lot of cash
over the years, different transac-
tions. For me to put the money into
‘I have no idea and I
don’t want to know’
Celia Larkin says she knew little about Bertie Ahern’s finances
my bank account in Galway – I live in
England, not exactly here – there
would be problems of cheques, writ-
ing out cheques or whatever. It was
much easier to deal with it that way.
That is my way of working.’
He understood that the first expen-
diture to come out of the money he
had handed over was to be the con-
struction of a conservatory, ‘and
there was also stamp duty to be
paid, as far as I remember’.
Mr Wall said he had decided to buy
a house in Dublin to use as a base
and that, in the course of a discus-
sion Mr Ahern, ‘mentioned that he
would be happy to rent it and stuff
like that and it went on from there.
‘I told him I would be interested in
the Drumcondra area or anywhere
near there and he mentioned that he
would like to rent the house if I was
going to do that, as I said I wouldn’t
be here. We had chats about it and
he also said that if I bought a house
he would have an option to buy it
when it suited him.
‘I said “fair enough”. It was a joint
decision. I looked at a couple of
properties, I didn’t just buy the first
one that came on the market…’
He left the job of finding a house
largely to Miss Larkin and Mr Ahern,
It was one of them who suggested
the house at Beresford Avenue.
‘And I went and had a look at it
from outside. I was quite happy that
that was a very nice area and it
suited, and so was Bertie, and I just
thought, well okay, that suits me and
that suits him.’
Asked whether he would find it
strange to live in the house with Mr
Ahern on his visits to Dublin, Mr Wall
said: ‘You are joking. I have been liv-
ing in lodgings and all sorts all my life
in days gone by. I am quite used to
living with people but I am amazed
you say I never lived with anyone
other than my family. I am not being
funny when I say that.’
Mr Wall paid an outstanding
deposit £10,800 then due on the
house out of his own funds. Asked
why this had not been paid out of the
stg£30,000 he had handed over to Mr
Ahern, Mr Wall said: ‘There is no rea-
son. That money was set aside for
future work. There was no point in
me ringing the solicitor and saying
hang on, there is money in Dublin or
whatever. It is just the way I work
and that is the way I paid for it.’
He was unable to explain why he
had paid his solicitor, Gerry Bren-
nan, £6,000 in cash in March 2005
rather than take the money out of
the account opened by Miss Larkin.
‘There is no answer to it. Your left
hand was doing one thing and your
right hand was doing another. As far
as I know, that £6,000 was money
that was paid at a later date or at the
time for furniture and carpets and
stuff that was in the house.
‘That is my recollection of that and,
again, I didn’t see why I’d rob Peter
to pay Paul. It all had to be
accounted for at the end.’
Items paid for out of the stg£30,000
included IR£8,000 stamp duty and
some IR£10,000 on a conservatory
and furnishings. But Mr Wall said
there was other spending. ‘There was
painting and other stuff, and I am
not sure if there was something done
to the roof.’
He left £3,000 with Mr Ahern and
Miss Larkin ‘in case there was further
work to be done – and I don’t know
whether he spent it on further bits
and pieces in the house. He asked me
if I wanted the money back and I said
no. I said leave that because no
doubt there is bound to be more bits
and pieces as time went on.’
After Mr Ahern had moved in, Mr
Wall did not visit the property again
until December 1995, when he came
over for Mr Ahern’s annual fundrais-
ing dinner – but chose to stay in a
hotel instead of Beresford Avenue
because he had friends with him.
The £450-a-month rent paid by Mr
Ahern had been calculated by their
mutual solicitor, Mr Brennan, as a
reasonable figure.
Mr Wall said that, in 1996, he de-
cided to make a will leaving the prop-
erty to Mr Ahern after he suffered a
serious accident.
‘I had seen death that close to me
which a lot of people haven’t seen
and it made me think and one thing
and another, and I had ideas about
redoing my will and that…
‘At this stage, I have realised that
Bertie has put so much into the
property. He was enjoying the prop-
erty. It was suiting him. He was
happy. And I asked Gerry Brennan
to draw up something legally to pro-
tect him in case anything suddenly
happens to me, as a temporary base.
And that is what was done and I
have been suddenly told that it is a
will but I didn’t classify it as a will.
‘The man was a good friend of mine
and he was already in the house. The
house suited him and he had already
put his own funds into the house.
Anyway, it was something that was
going nowhere.
‘I didn’t feel I was going to die at
this point but I had seen death in
front of me. And also the man was
going to buy the house, which he did.
So it was just a temporary thing.
‘He was now prime minister or
taoiseach and it suddenly dawned on
me, because I had a lot of time to
think when I was lying on the flat of
my back for six months, and I sud-
denly realised, well, if anything hap-
pened to me he could be thrown out
overnight. It wouldn’t be a very nice
situation.
‘It is only a small portion of my
overall assets and would have very
little bearing, if any, on the effect on
my family. Loads of people leave
property to people outside their fam-
ily. So it is nothing for me to do.’
Mr Wall also confirmed to the tri-
bunal that he reimbursed Mr Ahern
for money spent on the repair of the
house after it was damaged.
‘He could be thrown
out overnight’
Michael Wall’s testimony
By Frank Connolly
Page 14
Irish Mail on Sunday,
May 13, 2007
v1
The US banker, a
and $45k question
IT IS the one detail that has
most exercised PD leader
Michael McDowell – the
unexplained coincidence
that the money lodged in a
newly opened bank account
by Celia Larkin on December
5, 1994, exactly equalled
$45,000 at that day’s
exchange rate.
Again and again, he returned to it
in the press conferences and inter-
views that surrounded last week-
end’s ‘period of reflection’ by the
PDs over the Irish Mail on Sunday’s
bombshell revelations about Mr
Ahern’s personal finances.
Mr Ahern and Manchester busi-
nessman Michael Wall have both
told the Mahon Tribunal that the
money was in fact a stg£28,774.90
cash sum that Mr Wall contributed
towards the renovation and exten-
sion of what was ultimately to
become Mr Ahern’s house.
On Friday, Mr Ahern insisted: ‘I
never received any dollars at all – it
wasn’t dollars.’
Financial experts have told the
MoS that the chances of a briefcase
full of sterling cash equating to
exactly $45,000 could be measured
in odds of millions to one.
And today, the MoS can reveal
another remarkable coincidence –
one that both Mr McDowell and
the nation will inevitably want the
Taoiseach to address this week
when he eventually delivers the full
statement he has promised.
Mr Ahern, we have discovered, had
days earlier received a letter from an
American investment banker
thanking him for his assistance in
relation to the development of a
national stadium in west Dublin.
The Los Angeles-based invest-
ment broker, William O’Connor,
had met Mr Ahern, then finance
minister, in Government Buildings
on November 10.
He was accompanied by Cork
developer Owen O’Callaghan and
lobbyist Frank Dunlop, two of the
promoters of the stadium project.
The tribunal’s investigations into
Mr Ahern’s Byzantine finances
began following an allegation by
businessman Tom Gilmartin who
claimed that Mr O’Callaghan told
him he had given the Taoiseach
sums totalling £80,000 between
1989 and 1993 in connection with
the Quarryvale/Liffey Valley devel-
opment, also in west Dublin.
Mr Ahern and Mr O’Callaghan
have both vehemently denied the
claims – but our latest revelations
will inevitably pile further pressure
on both men. It may be entirely
coincidental, but the fact that Mr
Ahern was involved in meetings and
correspondence with the US banker
and with Mr O’Callaghan – a man
from whom he insisted last week he
never got as much as a lollipop –
days before the lodgment by Miss
Larkin is, at the least, intriguing.
O’Callaghan met
Bertie weeks
before lodgment
Mr Ahern has stated on a number
of occasions that he had little con-
tact with Mr O’Callaghan over the
years and has vigorously denied
receiving illicit payments from the
Cork developer.
The other promoters of the sta-
dium were architect Ambrose Kelly
and Liam Lawlor, a secret share-
holder who, along with O’Callaghan
and Dunlop, held equal shares in
Leisure West (Ireland) Ltd – the
company formed to develop a
£60m, 40,000-seat all-purpose sta-
dium at Balgaddy.
Mr Lawlor’s son, Niall Lawlor,
worked at the time in the Los
Angeles investment broker Chilton
O’Connor, of which William ‘Bill’
O’Connor was president and which
Mr Ahern visited in March 1994.
A diary submitted by Bertie
Ahern to the Mahon Tribunal and
seen by the MoS shows that the
meeting with Bill O’Connor to dis-
cuss government support for the
project, attended by Owen
O’Callaghan, took place on Thurs-
day November 10, 1994, at 10am.
Entered on that date in the diary
is: ‘O O’C/William O’Connor’.
Frank Dunlop’s diary confirms
that the meeting took place and
notes for that day: ‘10am American
(Bill O’Connor) to see BA.’
On November 28, Mr O’Connor
wrote to Mr Ahern to thank him for
receiving him in Government
Buildings just over two weeks ear-
lier. The letter was received by Mr
Ahern at the height of the crisis in
government, just after he had
replaced Albert Reynolds as leader
of Fianna Fáil and days before he
expected to become Taoiseach in a
renewed coalition with Labour.
In the letter, Mr O’Connor wrote:
Dear Tanáiste (sic), I would like to
congratulate you on your recent
unanimous election as leader of
Fianna Fáil and also thank you for
allocating the time to meet Mr’s (sic)
Owen O’Callaghan, Frank Dunlop
and myself on the financing plan for
the national all-purpose stadium.
We wish you every success on the
crucial talks you are embarking
upon and we hope to be in contact
in the near future to progress the
project. Wishing you every success,
Very truly yours, Bill O’Connor,
President.
CC Owen O’Callaghan, Frank
Dunlop.
On December 5, Celia Larkin
lodged a sum of £28,774.90 into an
account she opened on behalf, she
has said, of Michael Wall in the
Allied Irish Bank, O’Connell Street.
As revealed exclusively by the
MoS two weeks ago, Mr Ahern tes-
tified the money was given him by
Michael Wall in the form of a cash
payment of stg£30,000 in his con-
stituency offices, St Luke’s, Drum-
condra, on Saturday, December 3.
Mr Ahern has recently explained
privately to the tribunal that he
and Michael Wall agreed at their
meeting that day in St Luke’s that
the stg£30,000 would be provided
towards the refurbishment of a
house in Beresford Avenue, Drum-
condra, that Mr Wall intended to
buy and that Mr Ahern was going
to rent from him.
Mr Ahern said that during the
meeting, he agreed with Mr Wall
that he would put a further £50,000
towards the refurbishment. He said
they both agreed Celia Larkin
would open two accounts into
which the two sums would be
lodged. Miss Larkin lodged the
money two days later in separate
accounts opened on behalf of Mr
Ahern and Mr Wall at AIB O’Con-
nell Street, Dublin.
As we revealed last week, Mr Wall
told the tribunal during a private
interview in March last that he
knew nothing of Mr Ahern’s plan to
contribute £50,000. He also indi-
cated he did not know how the
stg£30,000, which he said he gave to
Mr Ahern rather than to Miss
Larkin, was actually used.
The stadium project has been the
subject of a detailed investigation
by the Mahon Tribunal. According
to the now disgraced ‘bagman’
Frank Dunlop, the project was the
inspiration of the late Liam Lawlor
who was also severely discredited
before his sudden death in a
Moscow car crash last year.
The lands where the stadium was
to be built, at Balgaddy near
Lucan, had originally been ear-
marked for a new town centre.
But that plan was switched to the
more commercially viable Quarry-
vale site on the other side of the
M50 at its junction with the N4 to
Galway and the west.
Owen O’Callaghan had pur-
chased an option to buy the Bal-
gaddy site, and he used it as lever-
age to gain a foothold in Barkhill
Ltd, the company set up by Sligo-
born developer Mr Gilmartin to
develop Quarryvale, now the Liffey
Valley retail centre.
Mr Gilmartin agreed to purchase
Mr O’Callaghan’s option on the
Balgaddy site through Merrygrove,
a subsidiary of Barkhill, and later
reluctantly agreed to allow Mr
O’Callaghan and AIB to become
shareholders in his company.
However, Mr Gilmartin was not
aware that another company
Leisure West (Ireland) Ltd,was
formed to develop the stadium pro-
ject on land owned by his company.
Neither was he aware, he says,
that the directors of Leisure West,
including Mr O’Callaghan, Mr Dun-
lop, Mr Lawlor and Mr Kelly, were
lobbying the government to sup-
port the stadium project from as
early as 1993. Neither was he
informed that lands owned by his
company, Barkhill, in which he held
a 40pc share, were to be transferred
to Leisure West Ltd.
The then taoiseach, Albert
Reynolds, and Mr Ahern indicated
that the government would invest
£5m annually towards the develop-
ment of the stadium and provide
additional funds from the National
Lottery. They also offered a tax des-
ignation on the Balgaddy site, mak-
ing it more lucrative for investors.
In 1993, Mr Lawlor introduced the
promoters to Chilton O’Connor,
where his son, Niall, worked. Docu-
ments seen by the MoS confirm
that Mr Reynolds visited Chilton
O’Connor for discussions on the
project during the summer of 1993.
On March 11, 1994, Mr Ahern,
during his week-long St Patrick’s
visit to the United States, called in
to the Chilton O’Connor offices, an
engagement he confirmed in a Dáil
answer later that year.
His visit, to help promote the sta-
dium, took place just one day after
a Fianna Fáil fundraising event
took place in Cork during which Mr
O’Callaghan gave a reported
£80,000 to the party. Fundraiser Des
Richardson was accompanied to
the dinner by Mr Reynolds, who left
for Washington the following day.
On May 6, 1994, Mr O’Connor and
EXCLUSIVE
By Frank
Connolly
Stadium project
was brainchild of
Liam Lawlor
Celia
Larkin
lodged the
equivalent
of $45,000
in Bertie’s
account
grandiose dream
haunting Bertie...
Paddy’s pal
loses e3m
to ‘al Qaeda
swindler’
Irish Mail on Sunday,
May 13, 2007 Page 15
v1
A FORMER business partner of
Bertie Ahern’s close friend Paddy
‘the Plasterer’ O’Reilly has been
swindled out of e3m in a billion-euro
land deal promoted by a man said to
have links with al-Qaeda.
Wealthy developer Noel Tynan, 49,
was lured into the doomed deal by
unscrupulous Australian-Lebanese
businessman Tony Mikhael.
Now he is involved in a protracted
legal battle over the 400-acre lake-
side site on the outskirts of
Bucharest, which was to be
developed into a major theme park.
The case between Mr Tynan and
Mr Mikhael has already been heard
at a sitting of the commercial court
in the Romanian capital. It ruled in
favour of the Dublin businessman.
But the decision was appealed and a
judgement will be delivered in two
weeks’ time, on May 27.
This weekend, Mr Tynan con-
firmed he had lost millions in the
deal. But the wealthy developer, who
is part of the Drumcondr a set that
regularly share a pint with the
Taoiseach in Fagan’s, insisted he
could live with the hefty loss.
‘It’s not the end of the world,’ he
said. ‘The major concern in my life is
that I’m healthy and my kids are
healthy and that’s all that matters.
‘Officials at a Romanian embassy
told me Tony Mikhael has links with
al-Qaeda but I don’t think he has.’
Mr Tynan lives in the heart of the
Taoiseach’s north Dublin con-
stituency and his home is just a short
distance from the red brick house
Paddy ‘The Plasterer’ O’Reilly
shares with his wife, Camilla.
Mr O’Reilly is one of the Drumcon-
dra dozen who gave the Taoiseach a
financial dig out in the mid 1990s
after the collapse of his marriage.
This weekend Mr Tynan acknowl-
edged that he and Mr O’Reilly have
been involved in a number of busi-
ness deals together. But he stressed
that Mr O’Reilly was not involved in
the controversial Romanian deal.
According to close pals of Mr
Tynan, he was approached to become
involved in the doomed deal follow-
ing the withdrawal of a prominent
Irish developer whose suspicions
were aroused by Mr Mikhael.
The 400-acre parcel of land was
apparently given to Mr Mikhael in a
questionable land deal. The site was
earmarked for a e1.2bn theme park
and golf resort.
In April of last year Mr Tynan
signed a e27.4m contract to buy a
50pc stake in the development. But
the deal collapsed when Mr Mikhael
failed to get the site transferred from
public to private land.
Meanwhile, Mr Mikhael has been
expelled from Romania, after
authorities discovered he had made
false statements in his application to
hold residency there.
By Valerie Hanley
Frank Dunlop, above, met Bertie Ahern in Government Buildings
Mr O’Callaghan again met Mr
Reynolds to discuss the financing
of the stadium.
During this period, the stadium
promoters persuaded Dublin Cor-
poration to dispose of further
lands it owned at Balgaddy at less
than their full market value.
In February 1994, the corpora-
tion agreed to dispose of 28 acres
at Balgaddy to Merrygrove to pro-
vide for additional car parking at
the proposed new stadium on the
adjoining site. The land was sold
by the council for a generous
£1,120,000 or £40,000 per acre.
Planning permission had already
been obtained, in August 1993, for
the 40,000-seat stadium, which
was to be built at a cost of £60m.
Efforts were made to persuade
the Football Association of
Ireland and other sporting bodies
to endorse the project. Later, in
1995-6, after Mr Gilmartin had
been forced from control of his
company, Barkhill, the promoters
worked with former footballers
and soccer pundits Eamon Dun-
phy and Joe Kinnear to bring an
O’Callaghan: ‘not a lollipop’
English premiership team to the
west Dublin stadium. Talks took
place with Wimbledon FC but
ended when the London club was
purchased by Scandinavians.
The stadium did not get off the
ground and Mr Ahern has said
since that he never supported it
but preferred the Abbotstown site
further north off the M50.
The lands at Balgaddy have lain
idle for years but, last year, were
designated by the Department of
the Environment as a special
development zone, greatly
increasing their value to their own-
ers, including Mr O’Callaghan.
The Mahon Tribunal is examining
claims that £1.5m went from
Barkhill’s accounts without Mr
Gilmartin’s knowledge and how a
large portion of it was allegedly used
to make payments to senior politi-
cians and to Dunlop and Lawlor.
Hearings into the Quarryvale
Two module will resume immedi-
ately after the general election. Mr
Gilmartin’s evidence will be fol-
lowed by more than 80 witnesses
including Mr Ahern, Miss Larkin,
Mr Wall, Mr Reynolds, Pat Rab-
bitte and several former members
of the corporation.
Neither Mr O’Connor nor
Chilton & O’Connor were con-
tactable this week.
BERTIE’S BANK ACCOUNTS AND LODGMENTS
Probing claims
£1.5m went
from account
1993
Dec 24:Bertie Ahern opens a loan account at
AIB’s O’Connell Street branch in Dublin and
takes out a £19,000 loan
Dec 30: Mr Ahern opens a Special Savings
Account (SSA) with the same bank,lodges
£22,500 ‘whip-around’ monies
1994
April 24:£27,164.44 (personal savings)
deposited to SSA account. The special
account maximum of £50,000 is reached.
Nov 29: Michael Wall pays £3,000 booking
deposit on the house in Drumcondra
Dec 3:Meeting in St Luke’s, Drumcondra
where £28,774.90 (the exact equivalent of
US$45,000) is handed over to Mr Ahern by Mr
Wall. Celia Larkin is also present. Money is
put in the St Luke’s safe.
Dec 5: Miss Larkin opens what she coins
the ‘Bertie account’,to which £50,000
received from Mr Ahern is lodged –
£27,164 in savings and the £22,000-plus
‘gift’ monies from friends.She opens a
‘Michael Wall account’ on the same day to
which she deposits £28,774.90,the
money received at St Luke’s two days
before.
1995
Jan 15:£50,000 withdrawn from the ‘Bertie
Account’ and lodged in Miss Larkin’s personal
Cashsave account.
Jan 27: £50,000 cash withdrawn from Miss
Larkin’s Cashsave account and returned to
Mr Ahern
Jan:Mr Wall pays balance of deposit for house
(£10,800) and £2,000 further towards the cost
(date not specified)
Mar: Mr Wall pays £6,000 to solicitor Gerry
Brennan in relation to the Drumcondra
house.(date not specified)
April:Mr Ahern opens another account, in his
daughters’ name,to which he lodges £20,000
May 15: £8,000 paid out of Miss Larkin’s
‘Michael Wall account’ to cover stamp duty
June 15:Miss Larkin opens a third account, for
renovations.
June 15: £11,743.74 lodged by Mr Ahern
into Miss Larkin’s renovations account
July 15:£9,665 more paid by Mr Ahern into the
renovations account (both of the above
payments were said to have come out of the
£50,000 withdrawn in January)
Dec: £19,115 (the exact equivalent of
stg£20,000) lodged to Mr Ahern’s loan
account,which is closed shortly
afterwards
During his interview,Mr Ahern was also asked
by the tribunal about a stg£20,000 lodgment in
December 1995,a stg£10,000 lodgment in
June 1995 and a lodgment on October 11,
1995,that equated to stg£25,000 ‘or its
equivalent’. However,neither he nor Miss
Larkin confirmed or explained any of these
figures.
■ Opinion – See Page 16
Page 12
Irish Mail on Sunday,
April 8, 2007
v1
Garda’s IT system
costs E1m a month
By Elle O’Sullivan
BERTIE AHERN is facing more
embarrassing questions about the
purchase of his home – thanks to
pressure from a leading figure in the
legal establishment.
The highly respected lawyer – who, for now,
is insisting on remaining anonymous – under-
took a forensic examination of the account Mr
Ahern has made about monies he has
received and the purchase of his house in
Drumcondra, north Dublin.
He says there are still many gaps in the
Taoiseach’s explanation of the almost
£100,000 he had accumulated in 1993 and 1994
when he was finance minister, including the
IR£50,000 he says he had saved between 1987
and 1993.
The lawyer has passed the document –
which has been seen by the Irish Mail on Sun-
day and is impressive in its detail – to Fine
Gael chiefs, and it could now be a timebomb
ticking under the general election campaign.
The document recommends specific grounds
for lodging formal complaints with the Stan-
dards in Public Office Commission (SIPO),
payments Mr Ahern said he
lodged in October 1994 could be
related to the purchase of the
house in Drumcondra – where
the Taoiseach now lives – by
Manchester bus driver Michael
Wall, which took place at the
same time. Mr Wall was the man
who drove guests on the night of
the Manchester meeting and
who, Bertie famously said, ‘did
not eat the dinner’.
The lawyer also questions the
credibility of Mr Ahern’s claim
that the whip-rounds were made
in the context of his marriage
separation.
The 1994 whip-round, Mr Ahern
said, was by four friends who had
intended to contribute to the
first collection. However, the
lawyer says in his analysis: ‘Is it
conceivable, or indeed believable,
that the contributors of the
IR£16,500 were prompted to help
Bertie Ahern around Christmas
1993 but did not get around to it
for a further 10 months?
‘Bertie Ahern first split from his
wife in 1987, a full six years before
he received the first tranche of
money – £22,500.
‘Why would people think that
he needed a dig out at Christmas
1993? After all, he was at the time
the minister for finance and in
receipt of a substantial salary.’
Mr Ahern claimed that the
Christmas 1993 whip-round was
linked to the difficulties arising
from the conclusion of a court
case in relation to his separation.
The lawyer added: ‘The other
event that happened in October
1994, which is of relevance in the
current context, is that he rented
the house he currently owns in
circumstances where the letting
agreement, according to himself,
contained an option to purchase.
‘His partner at the time was
Celia Larkin. Michael Wall, one of
his Manchester friends (the bus
company owner) purchased the
house at this time and, when he
viewed the house for the purpose
of purchase, he was accompanied
by the said Celia Larkin. As you
well know, an option to purchase
constitutes an agreement
whereby one of the parties to the
agreement is given the exclusive
right to buy for a specified sum of
money on or before a given date.
‘Also, the Stg£8,000 which came
from the unidentified millionaires
in Manchester was paid to him at
or around the same time, or at
least was lodged to his bank
account at the same time, and he
explained the source of this
money as the millionaire friends
who attended the function in
Manchester, which was also
attended by the same Mr Wall.
‘You must admit that this whole
business requires to be properly,
effectively and satisfactorily
investigated and teased out,’ the
lawyer wrote.
‘Also, why would Mr Wall, a
businessman from Manchester
who has no other property inter-
ests in Ireland, choose to buy a
house in the middle of Bertie
Ahern’s constituency, let it to
him for two years with an option
to buy, and then sell it to him?’
The writer said Mr Ahern had
given two different sums as the
amount he paid for the house –
on one occasion he said it cost
£138,000, and then he claimed it
had cost £185,000.
Mr Ahern said he engaged val-
uer Fintan Gunne (who con-
tributed to the 1993 whip-round)
before he bought the house in
1997, even though he already had
an option to buy at a price agreed
in early 1995.
He asks: ‘Why the need for a
valuer? After all, the price of the
option to him had already been
agreed when he rented the
house.
‘Also, the date by which he was
required to exercise the option to
buy the house for the price spec-
ified was also contractually in
SPECIAL REPORT
By Frank
Connolly
which investigates breaches of
ethics legislation, conflicts of inter-
est or improper financial dealings
by public representatives and offi-
cials and members of State boards.
On Tuesday, SIPO confirmed it
had begun an informal investiga-
tion into the payments made to
Mr Ahern while he was finance
minister following a complaint it
received from an unnamed indi-
vidual.
It is not known whether the com-
plainant to SIPO is the lawyer who
compiled the document which was
passed to Fine Gael MEP Jim Hig-
gins.
During his televised interview at
the height of the controversy last
September, Mr Ahern admitted he
received IR£22,500 in a whip-
round by a group of eight friends
at Christmas 1993.
The friends included then party
fundraiser Des Richardson, busi-
nessmen David McKenna and Jim
Nugent, estate agent Fintan
Gunne, Michael Collins, publican
Charlie Chawke and NCB Stock-
brokers executive Padraic O’Con-
nor, who paid by company cheque.
Mr Ahern also conceded that he
lodged the proceeds of a second
whip-round, totalling IR£16,500, by
four friends, Joe Burke, publican
Dermot Carew, Barry English and
Paddy ‘the Plasterer’ Reilly into his
bank account in October 1994.
Several of his donors were later
appointed to State boards, a mat-
ter which is the subject of the com-
plaint to SIPO. These are Joe
Burke, now chairman of the Port
Authority, David McKenna to
Enterprise Ireland, Jim Nugent to
CERT, Des Richardson to Aer Lin-
gus, and Padraic O’Connor to ACC.
At the same time, Mr Ahern also
lodged a sum of stg£8,000 which,
he said, was collected for him after
a dinner in a Manchester hotel.
In the confidential document,
the lawyer asks whether the two
Paddy ‘the Plasterer’Reilly donated to the whip-round
‘Whole business
must be teased
out properly’
Bertie separated
six years before
he got the cash
An anonymous lawyer has made
on money he received and given it
Back for the new series, Rosanna Davison and Ronan McCormack
FORMER CELEBRITY
Jigs’n’Reels contestant Paul
Byrom last night attacked
Government plans to take a slice
of the charity cash raised in the
hit RTÉ show.
Funds are generated by mobile-
phone companies involved in the
show, who agree to donate the
money to charity.
But around 17pc of what they
raise goes to the taxman – who
keeps 10c of every 60c raised.
BT Ireland, Eircom, Vodafone
and O
2
donate to charity the
money they make throughout the
show, beyond their own running
costs.
Last year, for example, they
helped raise more than ¨150,000.
Byrom said last night: ‘I think
it’s an absolute scandal.
‘I danced four hours a day for
last year’s show, as did the other
contestants, and with all the
money the Government has, they
take it from charity.
‘I’d like to see the day when a
government minister or Fianna
Fáil TD comes to my door. I’ll
have plenty to say to them.’
Writer and composer Karl
Broderick said: ‘It’s really sad
that the Government would want
to cream off some of the money
for themselves.
‘Someone in the tax office
should stand up and take
responsibility for this appalling
state of affairs.
‘The buck has to stop
somewhere and whoever it is
should explain why the
Government thinks it deserves to
take this money.’
This year’s contestants include
Miss World Rosanna Davison,
Gráinne Willis, Ros na Rún actor
Gavin Ó Fearraigh, 2FM DJ Ruth
Scott and Fair City actors Sorcha
Furlong and Gerry Byrne.
Marty Whelan presents and
rugby star George Hook and ex-
Riverdance stars Jean Butler and
Colin Dunne are back once more
to judge how well celebrities
dance as they are pitted against
each other.
The live Sunday-night show,
which will run over the next six
weeks, is proving a big hit with
viewers.
More than 400,000 people tuned
in to watch them last week.
It remains to be seen whether
the Government’s policy of
taking some of the proceeds will
turn off voters from picking up
that phone.
THE DISCREDITED computer
system used by the gardaí to get
information on criminals and
suspects has so far cost the
taxpayer e130m. And the latest
figures from the Department of
Justice also show that more than
e1m a month is been spent
maintaining and upgrading Pulse.
It cost e61.3m when it was
launched only six years ago. Details
about the spiralling costs of the
ineffective system come in the
wake of the recent Public Accounts
Committee report, which detailed
the Government’s waste of e13bn
in taxpayers’ money on cost
overruns, incompetence and
disregard for public funds.
The doomed PPARS computer
system to provide a payroll for the
health system’s 136,000 staff alone
cost e155m – an incredible e144m
more than the original estimated
costs – while the electronic voting
machine debacle cost e55m, with
e658,000 spent each year storing
the useless machines.
This weekend, opposition justice
spokesman Jim O’Keeffe said the
cost of Pulse was just another
sorrowful episode in the
Government’s ongoing record of
wasting money.
He obtained the embarrassing
figures about the continuing multi-
million bill for Pulse after
submitting a list of written
questions to Justice Minister
Michael McDowell.
‘The Government has a dreadful
record of waste in relation to
modern technology, Mr O’Keeffe
said. ‘This is another chapter on
top of the e-voting and PPARS
systems. Pulse is still not available
in every Garda station. It certainly
has had a lot more than teething
problems.’
Garda Representative
Association President John Egan
said: ‘An awful lot more work needs
to be done to make it effective.We’d
like to see mobile Pulse inputters
for the streets and be able to
access information on in-car
systems.
‘Being able to access pictures of
suspects on consuls in patrol cars
would also make us a modern
police force.’
However, Mr McDowell denies
that the controversial system has
been a failure.
Outrage over tax on
charity cash from
Celebrity Jigs’n’Reels
Irish Mail on Sunday,
April 8, 2007 Page 13
v1
place since the date of the letting
agreement. Add to all of the fore-
going, the claim that he had no
bank account from 1987 to 1993,
during which time he said he
saved £50,000.
‘Moreover, in the Dáil he said the
interest on the loans (you will
recall he explained that the
money he got from friends were
loans or debts of honour) was 3pc
yet, when he ultimately repaid the
money, he paid 5pc interest.
‘In respect of the lodgement or
series of lodgements – £50,000 – he
sought to explain this by saying
he saved this money between
1987 and 1993 and kept it in his
back pocket or in a shoe box or
wherever.’ (In fact, Mr Ahern told
Village magazine this week he
kept the money in a safe.)
‘Ask yourself this question: If,
during the course of an audit, a
tax inspector came upon a lodge-
ment in one of your bank state-
ments amounting to £50,000 and
you offered the explanation prof-
fered by Bertie Ahern, would the
tax inspector accept the explana-
tion?’
He continued: ‘When he took
the money [from the business-
men] he was minister for finance
and he is now the serving
Taoiseach of this country,’ adding
that the Bertiegate affair was one
of the most serious ever to arise
in respect of a serving member of
the government and that point
needed to be highlighted.
The lawyer said the fact that we
know Mr Ahern got significant
funds from friends and business-
men in 1993/1994, plus his own
£50,000 savings, meant the onus
was firmly on the Taoiseach to
show how he paid for his house in
Drumcondra, and to prove the
price he actually paid for the house.
‘It is therefore absolutely essen-
tial that the requisite proofs
underpinning the circumstances
whereunder Mr Ahern acquired
the house are discovered firstly
and then revealed.’
The lawyer also recalls that Mr
Ahern said he had paid capital
acquisitions tax and capital gains
tax. If Mr Ahern paid CAT, such a
liability on his part would only
arise if he received a donation of,
say, a sum of money or a property
or whatever.
He suggest Mr Ahern should be
asked to produce full and com-
prehensive details in relation to
the tax and set out a number of
questions which, he said, should
be the subject of an investigation
by SIPO.
Jim Higgins said the writer is an
eminent legal figure and added:
‘He made his concerns known to
me in recent months. I think the
questions, and many others,
should be answered by the
Taoiseach, with or without the
SIPO investigation.’
Bertie Ahern pictured with Michael Wall,the Manchester-based businessman, in 1991
Ahern should
produce details
of CAT payment
forensic analysis of Ahern’s statements on the
Fine Gael. It could blow the election wide open…
1.
Do the deeds of the house in
Drumcondra that Mr Ahern says he
bought in 1997 have his name on
them, thereby proving that he actually
owns the house?
2.
Does the mortgage deed for the
property confirm the Irish Permanent
provided the mortgage in 1997 – as Mr
Ahern has previously stated.
3.
How much did Mr Ahern actually
pay for the property?
4.
What details appear on the
particulars delivered Form – which is
a full financial summary of any
transaction which involves the
purchase of property in Ireland –
submitted by Mr Ahern’s solicitor to
the Revenue Commissioners.
5.
Where is, and what details are
entered on, the original letting
agreement from Mr Wall to Mr Ahern in
1995, which Mr Ahern said contained
an option giving him the exclusive
right to purchase the house for a
specified sum of money.
6.
Mr Ahern has confirmed that he has
paid capital acquisition tax – which
everyone has to pay when they receive
a gift or donation over a certain
substantial amount.What was the gift
or donation that led to a capital
acquisitions tax liability in the first
place?
7.
What is the date on which the
donation/gift was received and who is
the donor?
8.
In relation to capital gains tax
which Mr Ahern said he has already
paid, what transaction was he involved
in that led to the capital gains tax
liability.
9.
How much capital gains tax did he
pay?
10.
What are the names of the other
people involved in the property sale
that gave rise to a need for Mr Ahern
to pay capital gains tax.
11.
Did Mr Wall pay capital gains tax
when he sold the house to Mr Ahern
and how much did he pay?
12.
Did he pay income tax on the rent
he received from Mr Ahern for the two
years previous?
12 KEY UNANSWERED
QUESTIONS
of the week
Quotes
Quotes
‘Lots of sex. Lots of sex with
the same person’
SINÉAD O’CONNOR reveals the
secret of happiness
‘Every now and again, you have
to go, “F***ing hell, what the
hell am I doing in space saving
the world?”’
Actor CILLIAN MURPHY, star of new sci-fi
blockbuster Sunshine
‘Opt for eggs wrapped in foil
only, as this is recyclable
whereas plastic is not. If you
can’t say no to packaged eggs
then use the plastic mould to
create your own eggs next year’
A Friends of the Earth spokesman does
his level best to take the fun out of Easter
‘You need 19-year-olds
snogging and vomiting’
LIZ HURLEY on the perfect wedding
‘I’ve never been at an orgy and I
wouldn’t know where the legs
should be and arms should be’
MAEVE BINCHY on why she doesn’t
include sex scenes in her books
‘How dare they use my child as
a way to fight their battles?’
ANNE BOURKE, whose seriously ill two-
month-old son was left in limbo in the
Midlands Regional Hospital because of
the nurses’dispute
‘We both look forward to the
visit to the battle site at the
Boyne – not to refight it
because that would be unfair,
for he would have the home
advantage’
A conciliatory IAN PAISLEYplans a trip
with Bertie Ahern
‘The delicious irony is that my
bitter enemies are going to
operate the structures and
mechanisms we put in place nine
years ago. I shall enjoy that’
DAVID TRIMBLE,ex-leader of the UUP,on
Sinn Féin and the DUP joining forces at
Stormont
‘Thank God it was early. I can’t
begin to imagine what it would
have been like if any one of us
had been to the bar’
An unnamed Irish minister after several
members of the Cabinet were temporarily
stuck in a lift at Government Buildings

Loading

© 2015 Village Magazine

Back to Top