Mr Denis O'Brien would not comment when asked if his claim yesterday that Mr Seβn Doherty TD was "unfit" to chair the rail signalling inquiry was calculated.
Yet it seemed the former Esat chairman was determined to put that view across to the subcommittee investigating a £36 million overshoot on CI╔'s rail signalling project. The inquiry has heard claims that CI╔'s construction of a telecoms system on the railway undermined its own signalling project, which is still incomplete.
Just 12 minutes into the hearing, Mr O'Brien questioned Mr Doherty's credibility. When asked whether he wanted to withdraw the comment, he repeated the assertion, saying Mr Doherty should not be in the post because of his links to a telephone tapping scandal when minister for justice in a government led by Mr Charles Haughey in the early 1980s.
It was an audacious comment, repeated in a press release issued by Mr O'Brien's PR team after he left the inquiry. Indeed, he said he would stand by his statement when leaving the hearing.
The argument started as Mr O'Brien faced questions from Mr Pat Rabbitte TD on Esat's agreement to construct a telecoms system on the CI╔ rail network.
When Mr O'Brien and his associate Mr Leslie Buckley were asked by Mr Doherty to desist from conferring privately, Mr O'Brien claimed Mr Doherty's sole interest in the inquiry was "abusing" witnesses. "There would be a better chairman than him," said Mr O'Brien. "You are not fit to be the chairman, unfortunately. And I will say it again and again."
Mr Doherty said such statements were "outrageous" but declined to answer questions later. He accused Mr Buckley of not co-operating with the subcommittee, though that was denied.
If the inquiry has seen dull sessions with engineers questioned at length about copper wiring, Mr O'Brien's intervention upped the temperature considerably.
An experienced businessman of vast wealth who sits on the court of Bank of Ireland, he has faced questions at the Moriarty tribunal about payments to the former minister for public enterprise, Mr Michael Lowry. As minister, Mr Lowry awarded the State's second mobile phone licence to Esat. He is expected to appear at the inquiry.
Mr O'Brien said the other subcommittee members were "eminent parliamentarians".
The following gives a sense of the atmosphere at the hearing:
- Mr Buckley: "I am not being obstructive."
- Mr Doherty: "You are interfering with the proceedings."
- Mr O'Brien: "No he's not."
- Mr Doherty: "It is not in accordance with what is required in here."
- Mr O'Brien: "Do you want to know the information?"
- Mr Doherty: "Both of you now are haggling with the chair and I would respectfully again ask you to desist."
- Mr O'Brien: "The chair has no credibility."
If that smacks of slapstick comedy in what is a very serious forum, real business carried on at yesterday's hearing.
Central to Mr O'Brien's evidence was his denial that Esat's claim to be constructing a "national backbone fibre-optic network covering all major Irish cities" was a cornerstone of its flotation on the Nasdaq stock exchange in November 1997.
Mr Rabbitte disagreed, saying the statement would send a "certain impression" to the market.
Esat's flotation prospectus said: "Based on a signed letter of intent, the company expects to use CI╔'s rights of way to construct the network."
But CI╔'s solicitor, Mr Michael Carroll, said in evidence later in the day that he had no knowledge of such a letter and wanted "to get to the bottom of it because if there is a document of this nature, it may have very serious implications in the context of the Esat agreement."
While Mr O'Brien denied "understating" the letter's importance, Mr Carroll disagreed. He said: "This seems to be one of three bullet points that recur on three different occasions in support of the value of what's being offered in exchange for some $78 million of punters' funds, so to speak."