Telenor executive Mr Hans Myre was unaware a cheque he co-signed was to be used for a political donation to Fine Gael, the Moriarty tribunal heard today.
The £4,001.75 cheque was drawn from an Esat-Telenor joint venture account in October 1995 and was co-signed by Mr Denis O'Brien and Mr Myre. Esat and Telenor were partners in a bid to win the State's second mobile phone licence at the time.
In a statement to the tribunal, Mr Myre said his signature was on the cheque but that he could not remember signing it. He said he must have signed the cheque without any knowledge whatsoever for what the cheque was for and he did not know it was for a political donation.
All cheques from the account required the signatures of a party from Esat and a party from Telenor. Only the signatures of Mr Denis O'Brien or Mr Peter O'Donoghue from Esat and Mr Per Simonsen or Mr Myre from Telenor could authorise cheques from the joint account.
Mr Myre told the tribunal that he would never have agreed to sign a cheque for a political donation.
In a letter from the tribunal solicitors to Mr O'Brien's solicitors, Mr John Davis for the tribunal said that it was reasonable to conclude Mr Myre's signature had been procured by misrepresentation.
Mr O'Brien, through his solicitors, said he had no recollection of signing the cheque and what the cheque was for but noted banks accounts showed the cheque was for Fine Gael.
Ms Sarah Carey, a marketing director with Esat, brought the cheque to the bank and converted it into a bank draft, the tribunal heard. She sent the bank draft to Mr Phil Hogan TD with a letter explaining the draft was a donation from Esat for a Fine Gael fundraising golf classic and that Mr O'Brien had requested no reference to Esat should be made at the event, the tribunal was told.
Mr O'Brien said he was aware of the sensitivity of the license bidding process and did want to have any reference of Esat at the golf classic as a result.