A witness at the Moriarty tribunal has "five million reasons" for hoping the inquiry reaches an adverse finding in relation to the award of the State's second mobile phone licence, it was claimed today.
Mr Bill Shipsey SC, counsel for financier Mr Dermot Desmond put it to Mr Tony Boyle that because he was now suing the State over the award, that he had "a material interest in the tribunal outcome". Mr Desmond was an investor in the company which won the competition for the licence in 1995.
This material interest amounted to at least £5 million because Mr Boyle chaired the Persona consortium - which is understood to have come second in the competition - Mr Shipsey suggested.
Mr Boyle had indicated under cross-examination that £5 million had been spent in preparing the consortium's licence application. He also agreed that he was spending several hundred thousand euro on monitoring certain modules of the tribunal in relation to his pending High Court action against the State.
Mr Boyle confirmed today that the action would be proceeding irrespective of the outcome of the tribunal.
Mr Boyle had earlier claimed that he met Mr Desmond, at a box held by businessman Mr JP McManus at Aintree racecourse, Liverpool, in 1995.
He said Mr Desmond indicated during a brief conversation that Mr O'Brien had asked him to become involved in his consortium bidding for the licence. According to Mr Boyle, Mr Desmond said he had declined the invitation, saying "he'd had enough of telecoms - superlative [an expletive] attached".
Mr Desmond has claimed in his statement to the tribunal that the meeting never took place but Mr Boyle was adamant that it had and that his business partner in Persona, Mr Michael McGinley, made the introduction.
He told the tribunal that Mr Desmond also said he knew who Mr O'Brien would "use to get to [then minister for communications Mr Michael] Lowry". He said he did not ask the identity of the person allegedly referred to by Mr Desmond.
He said he was not unduly concerned by the alleged claim at the time and considered Mr Desmond's refusal to become involved in the bidding as more important. He says he relayed the information to Mr McGinley and the consortium's solicitor Mr Colm Maloney.
But when it emerged that Mr Desmond was an investor in Mr O'Brien's Esat Digifone after the consortium won the competition in late October 1995, "the significance of that comment became clear," Mr Boyle said.
He also denied defying a request by the panel assessing the bids not to submit further information after submissions closed. Mr Boyle had written to the then minster for finance, Mr Ruaírí Quinn on October 10th, just two weeks before the winning bid was announced.
He said the letter outlined details of the Persona bid and was not new information and he therefore felt he was acting appropriately. Mr Boyle had a meeting with Mr Lowry earlier in the bidding process in which he says he made a "sales pitch" on behalf of Persona.