Enda Kenny unsure if firebomb and phone bill are linked

Taoiseach Enda Kenny insists he cannot say if a firebomb attack on the constituency office of TD Michelle Mulherin was linked to controversy surrounding a €2,000 phone bill she ran up calling a friend in Kenya from Leinster House.

The Mayo constituency colleague of Mr Kenny has reimbursed Oireachtas authorities for the €2,000, despite insisting 24 hours previously that the calls to her friend, Danson Kole in Kenya, had not been personal in nature.

Mr Kenny said that Ms Mulherin was “upset” by the attack on her office, and that fire-bombing was unacceptable.

"I'm appalled that anyone would attack an office like this" - @EndaKennyTD reacting to the attack on the office of Michelle Mulherin #ntfm.

— Pat Kenny Newstalk (@PatKennyNT) January 28, 2015

“As a public representative I am appalled that anyone would attack an office like this,” Mr Kenny said.

“I understand the gardaí have arrested someone on suspicion of this, who has a number of particular problems.

“In respect of a person’s political views, we are all public representatives across an entire spectrum and while protest is perfectly legitimate, there is no case for fire-bombing any constituency office of anybody, irrespective of which party or none that they represent.

“So it is to be condemned. I know that she is upset about it,” Mr Kenny told Newstalk.

Ms Mulherin was in Dublin at the time of the attack on her office in Ballina.

She admitted to making a number of calls to the Kenyan number after a newspaper revealed she was the only Oireachtas member signed in for all the days listed for the communications.

Ms Mulherin said they were work-related as they were concerned with an article regarding her and Mr Kole which she claimed was defamatory.

However, as the article did not appear until April 2012, Ms Mulherin has not explained the reason for previous calls going back to November 2011.

Meanwhile, Meath-East Fine Gael TD Regina Doherty said she had received a threat to burn her house down with her children in it.

“I had an incident a number of years ago where a particular gentleman saw fit to ring my office and tell me he was going to burn my family home down with my children in it...

The gardaí were able to track down the gentlemen and discuss his behaviour and the ramifications with him,” Ms Doherty told Newstalk.