The Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, has stood by his sworn declaration that he does not recollect attending a 1989 meeting with property developer Mr Tom Gilmartin - despite testimony from former Fianna Fáil minister Mrs Mary O'Rourke that she was present at such a meeting.
In an affidavit to the Mahon tribunal submitted before Christmas, Mrs O'Rourke, now Fianna Fáil's leader in the Seanad, said Mr Ahern was present for the 1989 meeting in the Dáil, along with other Fianna Fáil ministers. The meeting is central to Mr Gilmartin's corruption allegations surrounding his bid to build a shopping centre in Quarryvale in west Dublin, which will form a major part of the Mahon tribunal's investigations this year.
Following the meeting, Mr Gilmartin says he was approached by an unidentified Fianna Fáil figure and told to deposit £5 million into an Isle of Man bank account if he wanted to get planning permission.
Speaking at the Citywest Hotel yesterday, the Taoiseach said: "I have given my evidence to the tribunal. I think everybody else has as well. I will continue to co-operate with the Mahon tribunal, and all the other tribunals as well any time that they request me to do so.
"I have been doing this now for seven years. I can't comment about anything that has come out in selective leaks. Obviously, that is a matter for tribunals how so much of confidential documents are in national papers. I am sure that they will be looking at that. But I won't be commenting upon them."
Speaking after a Fianna Fáil European Parliament selection convention, he went on: "I think in all of these cases the tribunal asks questions of people confidentially, who reply to those questions. The tribunal then deals with those issues. It is a matter for the tribunal after that. I have given my evidence to the tribunal and anything that I have said to the Dáil is the same."
Asked yesterday about the emergence of her affidavit, Mrs O'Rourke, speaking from her Athlone home, said she had given her declaration "under oath".
"I made my submission in the belief that it was private until it was made public at the tribunal," said Mrs O'Rourke, who lost her Dáil seat in the 2002 general election. However, she refused to criticise the tribunal, or anyone else for the disclosure of parts of the contents of her affidavit. "There is no point taking any inference. There is no imputation in what I am saying."
According to Ireland on Sunday and the Sunday Independent, Mrs O'Rourke has told the tribunal that the Gilmartin meeting took place in a room across the corridor from her Dáil office.
She said she had been invited to the meeting by Mr Pádraig Flynn, who was then minister for the environment.
He told her that Mr Gilmartin would create thousands of jobs. She said she stayed only briefly at the meeting, which she claims was also attended by the then Taoiseach, Mr Charles J. Haughey, Mr Ahern, Mr Flynn, Mr Ray Burke and her brother, the late Brian Lenihan.
Since Mr Gilmartin first aired the allegations, Mr Ahern has consistently said that he has no recollection of ever meeting with the property developer in Leinster House.
The Luton-based property developer, who seems set to give his evidence to the tribunal before June, claims that he met five times with Mr Ahern and spoke to him by telephone on two other occasions during 1988 and 1989. Mr Ahern has confirmed that three meetings took place in his offices in the Department of Labour on Mespil Road and in Fagan's Pub, near his Drumcondra constituency office.
Furthermore, Mr Ahern says he only spoke to Mr Gilmartin about the latter's plans to develop a site on Bachelors Quay, and not about Quarryvale. He confirmed also that he did ask Mr Joe Burke, who was then chairman of Dublin Corporation's planning committee and who remains a close associate of the Taoiseach, to talk to Mr Gilmartin about the Bachelors Quay project. In her affidavit, Mrs O'Rourke, according to yesterday's reports, does not claim to know anything about the alleged demand for £5 million that Mr Gilmartin says he faced.
