Gilmartin accuses Ahern of lying about alleged Leinster House meeting
Mr Gilmartin again insisted yesterday he had met several members of the Cabinet, including Mr Ahern, then Taoiseach Charles Haughey and Padraig Flynn at a brief meeting on February 1, 1989.
Mr Ahern claims he has no recollection of the meeting and believes he did not attend any such meeting as there was no record in his diary of having met Mr Gilmartin around this time.
Asked by Bernard Madden, for Mr Flynn, if Mr Ahern had been telling a lie, Mr Gilmartin replied: "Recollection seems to be a nice word for getting around house rules, but he is actually lying."
Posed a similar question about Mr Flynn, he said: "He is not telling the truth so you can define that however you like."
But tribunal chairman Judge Alan Mahon said the question of whether Mr Ahern was lying could not arise because he had only stated that he could not recall such a meeting.
Mr Madden said Mr Flynn's evidence would be that he had no recollection of ever having attended any such meeting as described by Mr Gilmartin "in Leinster House or elsewhere". However, tribunal member Judge Gerald Keys pointed out this statement did not exclude the possibility such a meeting had taken place.
Former minister Mary O'Rourke has told the inquiry she recalls such a meeting, although several other former FF ministers claim no such memory.
Mr Flynn also denies having been in Dublin on the date Mr Gilmartin claims he handed him a cheque for £50,000 in 1989.
Mr Gilmartin said he believed he met Mr Flynn in his office at the Customs House on June 2 that year because that was the date on the cheque. However, Mr Flynn claims he was in Mayo throughout that day because it coincided with the nominations for the general election and the European election tour.
Mr Gilmartin retorted that the date didn't really matter as both he and Mr Flynn accepted a cheque for £50,000 had been handed over during a meeting between the pair.
The tribunal yesterday ruled that a draft statement dictated by Mr Gilmartin to a Dublin solicitor, Noel Smyth, in 1998, and documents relating to interviews conducted between the developer and the inquiry's legal team at its investigative stage, could not be circulated to other parties.
The material had been sought by legal representatives of people against whom Mr Gilmartin had made allegations to assist in their cross-examination of the witness as they believed they highlighted a number of inconsistencies in his recollection of events.
However, Judge Mahon said the documents remained confidential and the tribunal was satisfied there were no exceptional circumstances for disclosure.
Mr Gilmartin's lawyers corrected his earlier evidence that he had informed Tánaiste Mary Harney, about a meeting with FF ministers at a house party in Dublin in the late 1980s.
Mr Gilmartin now accepted he had confused the dates of two such parties. He now believes he met Ms Harney at a function in December 1988 several months before the alleged meeting with Mr Ahern and others in Leinster House.
