A defiant but relieved Taoiseach Bertie Ahern today said he expected to be fully vindicated by a forthcoming report by an anti-corruption inquiry.
After enduring four days in the witness box at the Mahon tribunal, the Fianna Fáil party leader repeated denials of ever accepting bribes in public office.
The state inquiry focused its investigations on a complex tangle of bank transactions carried out by Mr Ahern during the 1990s while he was Minister for Finance and later Opposition leader.
Former developer Tom Gilmartin had alleged to the tribunal that Mr Ahern had accepted bribes from Co Cork builder Owen O'Callaghan.
But with fists clenched, Mr Ahern told reporters after his testimony at Dublin Castle: "The issue is whether Owen O'Callaghan gave me any money and you have listened me for four days and I don't think anybody can say that."
The Taoiseach, who was re-elected for a third time in June, said the time taken by the inquiry to compile its report on the issues was "totally a matter for the tribunal".
He also told reporters he was happy with his performance in the witness box. He may have to return next month to the tribunal, sitting at Dublin Castle, to answer other allegations.
Earlier Mr Ahern recalled in the witness box how he first became aware of allegations that he lodged US dollars into his bank account. The issue dominated the first half of his party's general election campaign in May.
He told his barrister Conor Maguire that it had come as a "shock" to him when he first heard of the claims at a private meeting with the tribunal.
He insisted he wasn't shown any documents by the inquiry to substantiate the allegations.
He also recalled that the allegations first emerged in the national media a few weeks before the 2007 general election was called.
"It became a major issue for a period," Mr Ahern said.
Tribunal chief barrister Des O'Neill also suggested that Mr Ahern had failed to specifically ask for bank records on foreign exchange transactions which the tribunal was seeking.
Mr O'Neill claimed that, according to AIB bank documents, Mr Ahern asked bank officials about foreign exchange transactions only once during a three-year correspondence between 2004 and 2007.
But Mr Ahern replied: "I did ask about odd sums of money from the start. I did try."
Mr Maguire objected to the questions and said that the Taoiseach was being accused of non-compliance with the tribunal.
But tribunal chairman, Justice Alan Mahon intervened: "It is part of the process of examination and to establish the facts."
Mr O'Neill claimed that the recollection of Mr Ahern and that of AIB bank staff differed on the issue.
Defending his robust examination, Mr O'Neill said: "This is not a trial of Mr Ahern. He is not facing an allegation nor does there has to be an allegation for him to be here."
Earlier Mr Ahern said he couldn't exactly recall a day which his former partner Celia Larkin said he drove him to a bank on Dublin's O'Connell Street to lodge a sum of money.
He quipped: "If I was to remember every time I drove up and down O'Connell Street, I'd be doing well."
Mr Ahern said he didn't have a ministerial car or driver at the time as Fianna Fáil were in Opposition at that time. But he had hired another personal driver around March 1995.
PA