Achy-Breaky Bertie and his unbelievable truth

HE MAY have been the Mad Dog of the Middle East, but even Colonel Gaddafi had enough sense to steer clear of Ireland — the Wild West of casino capitalism — when it was going down the tubes in late 2010.

For that is when the National Treasury Management Agency was dispatched to Tripoli to plead with the murderous despot to take a 24% stake in the Bank of Ireland for €1.4bn.

But after the meeting with Irish government officials, Gaddafi insisted he did not feel “comfortable” with what was happening in Ireland, and thus politely declined to fill the begging bowl in front of him.

It is one of the few new facts to emerge from a banking inquiry which is sinking under the weight of its own anti-climax.

Indeed, there are now demands at the inquiry for an investigation to be set up into the investigation because one of the investigators thinks things have gone so badly wrong with it, and special treatment has been given to some of the people it is supposed to be probing, such as the finance department and the Central Bank. Most curious.

As if this was not enough to damage the credibility of the whole enterprise Bertie Ahern rocked-up at the banking gig to, ahem, tell the truth about what happened on his watch.

Given that the government went to grovel before Gaddafi due to the imploding economy just 18 months after Ahern left office under a very dark cloud following his risible performances in the witness box of the Mahon corruption probe, all eyes were on him.

As the Mahon probe found his evidence to be unbelievable regarding where all those large cash dollar and sterling lodgements sloshing around the 20-plus back accounts he held while finance minister came from, this was always going to be a colourful occasion.

Unbelievable Bertie does not like answering questions, as evidenced when this column approached him last November at one of his rare public appearances.

As Ahern indulged in soft-focus musings to assembled journalists at the GPO launch of the 1916 commemorations, this is the full ensuing exchange.

Irish Examiner: “On history, Mr Ahern, the Mahon Tribunal found your testimony to be unbelievable — they called you a liar, effectively...” Ahern: “You enjoy your night, ha, ha, ha...

Irish Examiner: “You’ve never answered any questions on that, or responded...” Ahern: “I’ll sure not to you, ha, ha, ha...” And, with that, he scurried off into the throng, but not before administering a mild dig in the chest and a slight flash of hatred in his eyes.

So, I only got a dig-in, and not one of Mr Ahern’s infamous dig-outs, but now Bertie’s back, back in the spotlight, back in the witness box, back in the dock of public opinion.

Apparently Bertie does not venture out much these days (unless it’s a lucrative speaking engagement abroad), and is quite isolated (due to his tarnished reputation proving toxic for former hangers-on) so it was interesting to see him in the glare of the flash bulb again.

Coincidentally, it came just after senior gardaí have warned TDs about the threat to Leinster House posed by “fixated loners”.

A document from the gardaí on security stated that the danger from “fixated loners” could come from people who believe they have been slighted, those who think they are being tortured or investigated, or “from the deluded”.

Sadly, Ahern ticked all these boxes. He cut a lonely figure fixated by trying to restore his tarnished place in history.

He does slighted, tortured, self-pitying victimhood very well, as when he called the Mahon judges investigating him “low-lifes”, And above all else, his appearance before the banking inquiry proved he is certainly deluded.

It could be summed-up as: “Sure, I made the odd mistake, but so did everyone else, overall, I’d say I was pretty brilliant — oh, and it breaks my heart that everything got flushed down the toilet as soon as Brian took over.”

So there you have it, an Achy-Breaky Bertie and his unbelievable truth.

As the banking probe inevitably breaks down along party lines, Bertie was given a very soft ride by the Fianna Fáil boys on the inquiry, and in a telling aside during on of the “comfort breaks” Éamon Ó Cuiv wandered into the room, and in a reference to Bertie, said to an FF committee member: “Where’s the boss?” Old loyalties die hard.

Another little nugget unearthed by the Oireachtas probe is that far from being out of touch with the impending crisis as we had always assumed, the Irish Banking Federation did convene a meeting of the major banks’ chief risk officers in late 2007, just as the country was about to crash over into the abyss — but it was to discuss bird flu, not the cowboy capitalism practices that were about to drag us all under.

But that was then and this now, and Enda Kenny has saved us from such flaky financial shenanigans forever.

Em, except he hasn’t, as proven by the Irish Water fiasco where the Government tried to buy its way out of trouble by giving everyone who registered a €100 “conservation grant” to register for the utility.

But in a stroke of fiscal genius, you do not have to even pay your bill to qualify for the kick-back, just return the forms and a hundred quid suddenly appears in your back pocket — no questions asked.

So, Mr Kenny has come-up with the ingenious wheeze of giving water tax dodgers a tax rebate of up to €42m as a reward for tax-dodging. Tip-top Enda! It proves that Mr Kenny has certainly achieved his long-standing aim of making Ireland the best small country in the world in which to do business — unless you have the scruples of Colonel Gaddafi that is, and know a corrupt, rogue State when you see one.