The Mahon tribunal is to rule today on whether it will proceed with public hearings into the finances of Taoiseach Bertie Ahern.
Up to last Friday the tribunal was intending to call a number of witnesses from AIB, beginning tomorrow, concerning Mr Ahern's accounts, and then call Mr Ahern himself on Thursday of next week.
However on Friday morning Conor Maguire SC, for Mr Ahern, made a submission calling on the tribunal to cancel those hearings and the chairman, Judge Alan Mahon, will give his response to that submission this afternoon.
If Judge Mahon rules against Mr Maguire's submission, then the Taoiseach might challenge that decision in the High Court, a move that would mean the hearings would be unlikely to proceed until after the autumn, if ever.
Mr Maguire's submission was made on two grounds. Firstly, he argued that the tribunal should wait until it was finished hearing evidence from developer Tom Gilmartin before initiating the public hearings into Mr Ahern's finances. Because of Mr Gilmartin's age and his health, the tribunal is taking evidence from him in the mornings only. To move matters forward it has decided to take evidence in the afternoons from witnesses who can be questioned about matters relevant to the Quarryvale module, but who do not require Mr Gilmartin's evidence to be completed first.
The tribunal is investigating planning issues relating to the development of the Liffey Valley shopping centre at Quarryvale, Dublin. Mr Maguire has argued that the inquiry into Mr Ahern's finances began because of a "flimsy" and "threadbare" allegation made by Mr Gilmartin. Mr Gilmartin's evidence should be heard in total before his client was called as the nature of Mr Gilmartin's evidence could affect the tone of what occured thereafter. Mr Maguire said Mr Gilmartin was not a credible witness. Also, there was a real danger, he said, that Mr Gilmartin would end up commenting from the witness box about Mr Ahern's evidence after Mr Ahern had given that evidence.
Furthermore, he argued, there was no evidence that allegations of payments to Mr Ahern should properly form part of the Quarryvale module.
He also referred to a decision by the Supreme Court on July 4th. The decision means the tribunal cannot now proceed with a list of further topics for inquiry. Mr Maguire argued that the tribunal was trying to fit the inquiry into Mr Ahern's finances into the Quarryvale module "to overcome this jurisdictional hurdle".
Judge Mahon queried the suggestion that the tribunal should come to a decision on Mr Gilmartin's credibility, without having heard from a number of witnesses including Mr Ahern.
Mr Maguire, responding to the chairman, also said that if the tribunal accepted his argument that the tribunal had no jurisdiction to call Mr Ahern in the wake of the Supreme Court decision, then Mr Ahern would not be a witness in the Quarryvale module and all inquiries in relation to him would be dropped.
