O'Brien's father says tribunal engaged in `witch-hunt'

The father of businessman Mr Denis O'Brien has accused the Moriarty tribunal of engaging in a McCarthy-style "witch-hunt" against his son.

Mr Denis O'Brien snr described the tribunal's challenging of the businessman's right to travel to London for the birth of his child as "a very severe invasion of privacy of the family".

Speaking on RTE's Liveline programme yesterday, Mr O'Brien said he thought it was "incredible" that the tribunal would ask for a medical report on the condition of his son's wife, who had to undergo a Caesarean section.

He added: "As far as I am aware, he has been told he should have been back this morning. Regardless of whether she had a Caesarean, or regardless of whether she had a healthy baby or otherwise, or regardless of whether she would have any setbacks, this is an extraordinary demand to be made on a citizen of this country who has been totally co-operative with the tribunal to date."

Mr O'Brien, who with his son was a member of the eIsland consortium which bid for Eircom against the Sir Anthony O'Reilly-backed Valentia group, also accused certain media outlets of unfair and biased reporting of the inquiry.

"Let's be absolutely frank about it. Denis was the under-bidder in Eircom. He was bidding against the O'Reilly consortium. It's a heck of a coincidence that the main [O'Reilly] papers, the Independent during the week and the Tribune on Sunday, are the most critical of them. If you look at it [the coverage], I mean, it's incredibly biased without anything said in Denis's defence."

He said Mr Justice Moriarty should seek to ensure allegations were not reported as fact. "We feel this is a McCarthy of the 50s witch-hunt . . . We feel it's developing into an inquisition, that all of this stuff is being reported, inaccurately in many cases, and I'll say it, by the Independent and the Tribune . . . We can't wait for Denis to show that he is totally innocent of these allegations."

Mr O'Brien also claimed "part of the O'Reilly consortium" had tried to use the negative media coverage to encourage Mr Bill Collatos, the head of the US venture capital group Spectrum, to withdraw his support for eIsland. "One of O'Reilly's partners told him [Mr Collatos] Denis O'Brien was going to jail and his best advice would be for Spectrum to change sides."

Rejecting the allegation, a spokesman for Valentia said he would be "very, very surprised if we said anything like this", adding that the consortium assiduously avoided engaging in negative campaigning.

A spokesman for Independent Newspapers said it had no comment to make on the interview.