Ireland: Ex-PM says he banked British money

[Marcus Marulus]

Ireland: Ex-PM says he banked British money

By SHAWN POGATCHNIK, Associated Press Writer Wed Jun 4, 8:50 PM ET

DUBLIN, Ireland - Ireland's former Prime Minister, who recently resigned amid questions over secret payments in the 1990s, told a corruption tribunal Wednesday that British money he deposited into bank accounts in 1994 was his own, and much of it came from gambling.
Bertie Ahern had previously denied depositing British pounds into the accounts. He resigned a month ago amid incessant questions over tens of thousands of dollars he secretly received from business friends in Ireland and England in the early to mid-1990s.

Ahern, who denies doing anything wrong, was Ireland's finance minister and treasurer of the country's long-dominant Fianna Fail party during that period.

A judicial investigation established by Ahern's own government in 1997 has spent years trying to trace the various sources of money supplied to Ahern, who insists he granted no political favors in exchange for cash gifts and unpaid loans.

When Ahern last appeared on the witness stand in February, he testified that he hadn't deposited any British money in 1994 — the year he began using bank accounts again. But investigators told Ahern the following month they had found bank records showing he deposited thousands of pounds in 1994.

Ahern admitted Wednesday he did arrange to have an office secretary put that money into Dublin bank accounts belonging to both him and his two daughters. He said he previously thought he had spent the British money while traveling or betting on horse races in Britain.

Ahern said he now believed the money represented cash he won gambling on horses as well as his own Irish political income that he had converted into British currency when he was considering buying an apartment in England.

The 11-year-old probe has already exposed several of Ahern's former colleagues in Fianna Fail as serial collectors of corrupt payments from businessmen.

Ahern was drawn into the investigation when a property developer accused him of receiving two payments from a rival developer in the early 1990s. Ahern denies those allegations.

Ahern began testifying in September. His testimony was widely mocked and disbelieved, undermining his long run of personal popularity and command of a stable government since 1997.

He is scheduled to return to the witness stand Thursday and Friday.
The investigation seeks to establish the extent of political corruption, particularly involving land development, in Ireland from the 1970s to 1990s. Those caught by the tribunal have largely faced financial punishments for evading tax by failing to disclose their cash collections.
But none has been successfully prosecuted for accepting bribes — in part because Ireland had no effective laws regulating politicians' receipt of money until 1996.

On the Net:

Transcript of Ahern testimony, http://www.planningtribunal.ie/images/SITECON TENT_857.pdf

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