Business Opinion/Colm Keena: There is an operational rule of thumb used by scientists when they're trying to work out how the world works and which goes along the lines that if you have two hypotheses which can explain a particular phenomenon, then the simplest one is likely to be the correct one.

There is nothing simple about the matters currently being investigated by the Moriarty (Payments to Politicians) Tribunal in Dublin Castle though it may be that the rule of thumb used by scientists could be of value there nonetheless.

Million of euros of taxpayers' money are being spent on investigating whether or not Mr Michael Lowry did something to help Mr Denis O'Brien's Esat Digifone win the competition for the State's second mobile phone licence.

However, the prospect has now arisen that Mr Lowry may well have committed acts for which Mr O'Brien had reason to feel thankful, but that these had nothing to do with the mobile telephone licence.

On Friday the tribunal heard, almost as an aside, of a meeting between Mr Lowry and Mr Denis O'Brien in late 1996 where Mr O'Brien pleaded for the Department's help in relation to his land line business, Esat Telecom.

At the time the Department was acting as the telecoms industry regulator, while Telecom Éireann, the State-owned incumbent operator, was doing its best to fight off new competition.

Esat Telecom, was trying to grow its land-line business and was using new technologies which created legal and technical grey areas on which Mr Lowry's Department, as regulator, had to rule on. Mr Fitzgerald told the tribunal that after the meeting between Mr O'Brien and Mr Lowry he was asked by the minister to "go easy" on monitoring activities which were upsetting Esat Telecom .

This took place around the time that Mr O'Brien was about to seek desperately needed funds in the US for his growing telecoms business. He was doing so by way of a private placing and he was drafting as strong a prospectus as he could.

The pressure under which Mr O'Brien was operating under during 1995/1996 period is clear from the evidence to date. Growing Esat Telecom was eating up money and Mr O'Brien was trying to do it while having run out of funds himself and while seeking to retain control of the business he had established.

His plan was to raise funds in the US. He was pushing as hard as he could within the Esat Digifone consortium to up his shareholding, at the expense of his partners, so as to boost the picture he could present of his holding company, shares in which he was to place privately in the US. He was also seeking to boost the amount of fixed-line business Esat Telecom was winning at the expense of Telecom Éireann.

Mr Lowry was precluded from interfering in the mobile phone licence competition, but had a clear and proper function in relation to Esat Telecom's battle with Telecom Éireann. It was the Department's policy to introduce and encourage competition in the telecoms sector. Mr Lowry was personally in favour of this policy. He had a proper role to play in assisting those companies which were seeking to take on the established monopoly.

Nothing so far revealed by the tribunal in relation to the licence competition has indicated that it was interfered with by Mr Lowry. It was a complicated, mostly sealed process involving a number of civil servants and it is hard to see how it could have been queered without even one person involved becoming suspicious. Yet not one hint of such a suspicion has yet been voiced.

Which raises the question as to why, if the tribunal wanted to look for favours Mr Lowry may have done for Mr O'Brien, it chose to look at the competition process rather than at the land-line dispute with Telecom Éireann?

One possibility reason is the famous conversation between Mr O'Brien and the former CEO of Esat Digifone, Mr Barry Maloney, where Mr O'Brien said he had paid £100,000 to Mr Lowry. The comment, which is not disputed, was made during a conversation where Mr O'Brien was trying to cajole Mr Maloney into making a number of success fee payments to third parties involved in Digifone's mobile phone licence bid.

Mr O'Brien has said he was spoofing and doing so in the hope of getting Mr Maloney to agree to the payments. In truth from what we now know, this would not be out of character for Mr O'Brien. On the other hand, however, we also know that around the time of the conversation £150,000 was actually winging its way towards Mr Lowry. This money went from an offshore account belonging to Mr O'Brien, to an offshore account belonging to the late Mr David Austin, before being sent by him to an offshore account belonging to Mr Lowry.

Mr O'Brien has said the money was for a house in Spain he was buying from Mr Austin and that he knew nothing of the money being passed on to Mr Lowry. Mr Lowry has said the payment from Mr Austin was a loan. The tribunal will in time rule on the matter.

Nevertheless, could it be the case that the tribunal should be looking at Mr Lowry and Esat Telecom, rather than Mr Lowry and Esat Digifone? Is what is going on now a very expensive mistake?

A scientist, using the above quoted rule, would opt for the fixed-line inquiry over the mobile phone licence inquiry. However, the truth of the matter is that in time it is likely we will be subjected to lengthy public evidence about both issues. Mr Charlie McCreevy and the Department of Finance can but look on and weep.