O'Brien says 'Mail' article was 'spiteful'

Businessman Denis O'Brien has told the High Court in Dublin that a newspaper article about his efforts to assist after the catastrophic earthquake in Haiti in 2010 was spiteful, grubby and offensive.

The article in the Irish Daily Mail was the opinion of the writer Paul Drury but it was based on poor research and was littered with mistakes, Mr O'Brien said yesterday.

Published by Mail publishers, Associated Newspapers, on January 22nd, 2010, the article was headlined: "Moriarty's about to report, no wonder Denis O'Brien's acting the saint in stricken Haiti".

Mr O'Brien, chairman of the Digicel Group whose worldwide interests include hundreds of millions of investment in the mobile phone infrastructure in Haiti, says he was defamed in that article because it meant his involvement in the Haitian relief effort was a hypocritical act primarily motivated by self-interest.

He claims it meant his work in Haiti was an "ingenious feint" designed to distract attention from the pending final report of the Moriarty tribunal into payments to politicians, which made findings adverse to Mr O'Brien over the awarding of the Republic's second mobile phone licence but which the businessman strongly disputes.

He is seeking damages over the article which he says caused him considerable distress and injury to his character and reputation.

The Irish Daily Mail denies his claims and says the article was a piece of opinion honestly held and based on facts the author honestly believed were true.

On the first day of the case yesterday, Mr O'Brien told the court that Digicel had invested heavily in Haiti before the January 2010 earthquake. His company was very successful there, being one of the largest employers with 880 people.

Devastation and chaos

When news of the earthquake broke, he travelled to the capital Port au Prince where he witnessed devastation and chaos including the sight of thousands of people living on the side of the roads because their homes had been completely destroyed, he said.

His main focus initially was the situation of the company's staff, seven of whom had lost their lives.

After helping them, it was a question of assisting the wider community and trying to get some co-ordination between the aid agencies so as to deliver help most effectively.

During these first few days in Haiti, he gave an interview to RTÉ's Charlie Bird who Mr O'Brien had assisted in getting on to a flight into Haiti because there were huge difficulties in doing so.