ESAT Digifone would never have signed the country’s second mobile phone licence if the Department of Communications was unhappy financier Dermot Desmond had come on board, entrepreneur Denis O’Brien told the Moriarty Tribunal yesterday.

BUSINESSMAN Denis O’Brien pledged that Esat Digifone would remain Irish-controlled and there would be a three-to-one voting ratio in favour of the Irish investors, the Moriarty Tribunal heard yesterday.