PITY poor Gay Mitchell. At the weekend, his campaign to be elected President received a serious blow. He was effectively endorsed by Bertie Ahern.

THOUSANDS of rugby fans are set to gather for the world’s largest tag rugby festival next month.

LOUTH County Board could withdraw their motion for umpires to be neutral of referees in favour of the GAA’s plan for the officials to take training courses and exams.

THE Irish Stock Exchange swung back into the black last year reporting pre-tax profits of €6.3 million following losses of €15.4m in the previous year.

MORE than 120 tag rugby teams and 20 hockey teams have already signed up for Limerick’s Pig ‘n’ Porter festival.

LIMERICK will combine its strong rugby tradition with drink, food and fun for a huge festival which will draw up to 120 teams from this country and Britain.

TOP names from the stock exchange have been called before an Oireachtas committee today to discuss the regulation of stockbroking firms.

THE head of the Irish Stock Exchange (ISE) has warned that future international investment in Irish publicly-quoted companies depends on better corporate governance standards and global standards and expectations.

The Chief Executive of the Irish Stock Exchange Deirdre Somers has said that Ireland must learn the lessons of recent corporate governance failures in Ireland.

TALK of a swine flu was a no-no yesterday as Limerick presented plans for a big Pig ’n’ Porter tag rugby festival.

THE chairman of the Mahon Tribunal yesterday asked Taoiseach Bertie Ahern’s lawyer to withdraw what he called disgraceful and offensive comments.

LODGMENTS up to three times greater than his salary were discovered in Taoiseach Bertie Ahern’s personal deposit account with a building society during the early 1990s, the Mahon Tribunal heard yesterday.

THE Mahon Tribunal is to decide today on an application by Bertie Ahern’s legal team that has alleged the Taoiseach was being unfairly treated at the Dublin Castle inquiry.

US ELECTION fever appeared to grip Senator Mary White last night as she announced plans to run for the Irish presidency — almost a full four years before polling day.

HE’S making a list, he’s checking it twice, he’s gonna find out if Bertie’s naughty or nice — Judge Mahon’s coming to town...

BERTIE AHERN yesterday rounded on top-flight stockbroker Padraic O’Connor — the man he called a close personal friend — who gave him £5,000 in 1993.

FIANNA Fáil Senator Mary White is set to net up to €1.2 million from the sale of Lir, the chocolate making company she co-founded. Ms White owns 15.2% of the company, which yesterday agreed to an €8m takeover by British firm Zetar.

FOR sentimental reasons, Maureen Gunne told the Mahon Tribunal yesterday she has kept Bertie Ahern’s personal cheque for €5,914 — the proceeds of a loan, plus interest — given to the Taoiseach by her late husband Fintan 13 years earlier.

A DIRECTOR of NCB Stockbrokers told the Mahon Tribunal yesterday he and a senior colleague were “not particularly happy” a bogus invoice was used to make a payment linked to Bertie Ahern.

YOU don’t know who your friends are until the chips are down — but unfortunately for Bertie Ahern the chips in question are the ones earmarked for that mysterious Phoenix Park casino scheme.

BERTIE AHERN last night angrily denied his premiership was becoming paralysed due to the amount of time he is being forced to devote to the Mahon corruption probe.

Lodgments, loans and lost friendships — the Mahon Planning Tribunal has turned the spotlight on a series of puzzling events before Christmas 1993, reports Conor Ryan

IN September 2006 An Taoiseach Bertie Ahern went on RTÉ and described NCB stockbroker Padraic O’Connor as among his long-standing friends.

POLITICAL fundraising has always been a murky business, carried out by the very smoothest party apparatchiks on the fringes where business and politics collude.

ECONOMIST Padraic O’Connor — the former head of NCB Stockbrokers — told the Mahon Tribunal yesterday he still does not understand how two close associates of Bertie Ahern could have considered him to be a personal friend of the Taoiseach.

TOP economist Padraic O’Connor — who signed off on a £5,000 payment that Bertie Ahern says was to go towards his marital separation legal costs in 1993 — yesterday disputed the Taoiseach’s description of him as being a personal friend.

FORMER Fianna Fáil chief fundraiser Des Richardson told the Mahon Tribunal yesterday he discovered only this year Bertie Ahern had taken out a bank loan 14 years ago to meet legal bills arising from his marriage separation, rather than use £22,500 raised in a whiparound.

Padraic O’Connor has been appointed as chairman of the Irish Stock Exchange at the annual general meeting of the Exchange held this morning in Dublin.

TAOISEACH Bertie Ahern issued a statement yesterday complaining that he has been the victim of an unlawful and malicious smear campaign.

After it was disclosed that Ben Dunne had paid for renovations to Michael Lowry’s house, Bertie said the “first duty of any minister is to the public whom he has been appointed to serve.

VINCENT BROWNE’S questioning of the Taoiseach at the launch of the Fianna Fáil manifesto on Thursday was riveting. Bertie Ahern was refusing to answer questions about the £30,000 he got from his friend Michael Wall in December 1994.

EIRCOM directors stand to make €7.8 million from the sale to Babcock & Brown.