A businessman told the tribunal he contributed £5,000 cash towards a collection to help Bertie Ahern even though he had only met the then minister for finance on three or four occasions at the time.
Barry English said he was 28 years old and had just returned to Ireland earlier that year after a number of years abroad when in September 1994 he discussed Mr Ahern's "difficult circumstances" with three others in the Beaumont House pub, Dublin.
Mr English, an engineer, said he was working for the Kent Group and living in a house in Ballsbridge supplied by the group.
He met Joe Burke socially and the two men became friendly. Mr English said he had just returned from abroad and "was trying to network". He had met Mr Burke 10 to 14 times in the period to September 1994, and had been introduced by him to Mr Ahern during pub meetings.
All his meetings with Mr Ahern had occurred when he was socialising with Mr Burke.
He said he never discussed Mr Ahern's family affairs with him and would not have considered himself to be a close friend of Mr Ahern's at the time.
He said he could recall a conversation with Dermot Carew, Paddy Reilly and Mr Burke in Beaumont House in or around September 1994. His recall was that it concerned Mr Ahern's circumstances at the time being difficult due to his separation.
Asked why he decided to give £5,000 to someone he hardly knew, Mr English said he "went with the flow of the conversation that night . . ."
He later dropped £5,000 in cash to Mr Carew in the pub. He sourced the cash from savings and had no paper record of the payment.
He said that at the time he was probably earning more than Mr Ahern. The sum "would not have been a lot to me personally at the time".
