FOREIGN BANK ACCOUNTS:FORMER TAOISEACH Bertie Ahern has said he never had a bank account outside Ireland.
He said he had been accused of having money in Mauritius, in Liechtenstein, in Manchester and in Timbuktu and "other exotic places", but this was not true.
Counsel for the tribunal Des O'Neill asked Mr Ahern if it was possible that he had forgotten about a foreign bank account in the same way as he had forgotten about a number of sterling lodgements discovered by the tribunal.
Mr Ahern said no.
"I've never had a bank account of any kind outside the Republic of Ireland," he said.
Mr Ahern said forged documents had been put together at one stage by a financial institution to show he had resources abroad. And on another occasion, an unsolicited cheque arrived in Drumcondra from a UK bank.
"There has been at least two occasions to try and force the position where I would have an account, but that's the joys of being taoiseach," Mr Ahern said.
He said if he had been trying to deceive people, he could have had his money in bogus accounts but all he did was lodge salary cheques.
"I was out working, out doing my job as a political leader for this country, working my butt off," Mr Ahern said.
"Not trying to make anything other than my own income and the few sums of money that I got from others. And then I end up with all this . . . That's the story of my life."
Mr Ahern outlined how he received a folder with £16,500 in cash in it when he went to Beaumont House pub in Dublin on a night in September 1994.
Mr Ahern said he was told by the owner of the pub Dermot Carew that the money was from him and three others, and was intended to help him buy a home.
He said he accepted the money on the basis it was a loan.
He said he was living in an apartment in St Luke's at the time and his friends thought it would be better for him politically if he had a better home.
Mr O'Neill said Mr Ahern had cash savings of up to £70,000 at the time and an arrangement with Manchester businessman Micheál Wall that he would rent a house in Drumcondra which Mr Wall was intending to buy. He asked Mr Ahern why he accepted the money.
Mr Ahern said he initially declined the money. "I didn't want the money . . . but I took it on the basis I would give it back."
The money was contributed by Mr Carew, Paddy Reilly, Joe Burke and Barry English.
Mr O'Neill said the largest single contribution was £5,000 and had come from Mr English. He said that at the time Mr Ahern had only met Mr English four or five times, in the company of others, in a pub.
Mr Ahern did not disagree, but said Mr English had since become one of his closest and most loyal friends.
