Ahern denies using separation to get public sympathy
As Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny again insisted he did not believe Mr Ahern’s evidence to the Mahon corruption probe, the Taoiseach accused the opposition of engaging in “sewer” politics.
Mr Ahern said he had been forced to expose details of his separation from wife Miriam in order to explain unusual lodgments to his accounts and those held on his behalf by his then partner Celia Larkin while he was finance minister in the mid-1990s.
Clearly still angry at the way some Fine Gael TDs used last week’s Dáil motion of no confidence in him to launch highly personalised attacks, Mr Ahern called for higher standards in public office.
The Taoiseach said some remarks by FG TDs in this regard were “straight out of the sewer”.
“I was disappointed by cheap shots that I was using my separation to elicit public sympathy.
“I have mentioned it because it is an indispensable factor in understanding why my financial affairs were, for a period, so difficult,” he added.
Mr Ahern said neither his life nor his marriage had been “perfect” and he had to use “unorthodox” methods to get his finances in order after separating.
The Taoiseach insisted he had co-operated fully with the Mahon investigation, but Mr Kenny said their was a “deep suspicion” over where the money lodged to Mr Ahern’s accounts came from.
The Fine Gael leader said the Taoiseach’s financial affairs were a throwback to the “Haughey-Lawlor era”.
“His private life is none of my business. His credibility is in shreds,” said Mr Kenny.
“I don’t believe him and his version. I don’t believe he has told the truth here.
“We have a head of Government who cannot explain how very substantial monies moved through his accounts backed up with blind allegiance from ministers, the Greens and the PDs,” said Mr Kenny.
“This does down public life and does down our country.”
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