A number of important questions remain to be answered about the most unusual circumstances in which the Fine Gael party received a $50,000 donation in May 1997. The money was paid to the party by a former Smurfit executive, the late Mr David Austen, who was given the money by Telenor, then a 40 per cent shareholder in Esat Digifone. Telenor had paid the money to Mr Austen in January 1996, a couple of months after Digifone had been awarded the second mobile phone licence, by the then Fine Gael minister, Mr Michael Lowry.
At the heart of the issue, is the identity of the ultimate donor of the money and the motivation for its payment. Fine Gael and Mr Denis O'Brien - whose Esat Telecom was the other main shareholder in Esat Digifone - issued statements yesterday, while Telenor also gave its version of events. Mr O'Brien and Telenor disagree fundamentally. The Norwegian company says it made the payment at the behest of, and on behalf of, Esat Digifone. Mr O'Brien is insistent that he merely referred Mr Austen to Telenor, when the former Smurfit executive came searching for donors to support a Fine Gael function in New York and that the Norwegian company made the donation on its own behalf. One obvious question is why, if Mr Austen received the money in early 1996, he only passed it on to Fine Gael in May 1997. Fine Gael says it initially thought that Mr Austen was the donor. The party says it only discovered at a meeting in February 1998 that Telenor was the donor, when approached by the Norwegian company, which was concerned it would be called before the Moriarty Tribunal.
Subsequently, Fine Gael says it attempted to return the money to Telenor. However the money was sent back to Fine Gael - the statements differ importantly on the precise sequence of events at this stage. The new Fine Gael leader, Mr Michael Noonan, now says he intends to repay the money. Fine Gael has some explaining to do. What did it know about Mr Austen's fundraising? Why was it not aware, until February 1998, of the identity of the company which took two tables at a function held in late 1995? Does the party support Mr Lowry's statement last night that he had no part in raising the money and knew nothing about it?
Crucially, having become aware of the donation, the party should then have revealed it to the Moriarty Tribunal. It says it had legal advice that it was not obliged to do so. Whatever about such advice, the party's clear motivation was to avoid the inevitable fuss that would result. This course of action raises the most serious questions about Fine Gael's attitude to the Tribunal. Clarification is also needed on who instigated the payment. Mr O'Brien is insistent it was Telenor. Why, then, did Esat Digifone refund the money to Telenor in April 1996? What is Mr O'Brien's version of the discussions which Fine Gael said it had with him on whether the money should be returned?
Telenor must clarify why, if the payment was proper, it was concerned about an investigation by the Moriarty Tribunal. Was the company aware - as Fine Gael says - that Mr Austen had not revealed that it was the donor? Esat Digifone has since been sold to British Telecom, yielding a handsome profit for its shareholders. Given the keen contest for the awarding of the licence, any contribution from a stakeholder in the winning consortium to Fine Gael shortly afterwards, was completely inappropriate. The affair must now be fully investigated and the Moriarty Tribunal would appear to be the appropriate body. And the case for ending corporate donations to politics is now, surely, unanswerable.