The Race for the Áras (32 page)

She explained that she picked up her information from the newspapers, as she had a big interest in current affairs, and added that revelations in the media that Gallagher had charged
GAA
clubs in his home county of Louth as much as €5,000 to help out with applications for sports grants ‘says so much about the man.'

While Lynch had brought Gallagher's record as an entrepreneur and businessman and his dealings into the glare of the television and radio spotlight, these issues had also been pursued in the print media. Colm Keena, the public affairs correspondent of the
Irish Times
, that morning published an article alleging that questions surrounding Gallagher's financial affairs remained. Gallagher's main source of income appeared to be from ‘motivational speaking', he said, and his fortunes rose with the property bubble but hit a wall with the rest of the building industry as that bubble burst.

The good news for
RTE
was that the ‘Frontline' programme was a huge success. Ratings for the station arrived that morning. They showed that the final debate in the race for the Áras had attracted a peak audience of 900,000, which would turn out to be just over half the total valid poll. The first television debate of the campaign, on
TV
3 with Vincent Browne, had a comparably high peak audience of 820,500 viewers.

Meanwhile that morning in Drogheda, McGuinness took a few minutes off the canvass with Gerry Adams in his constituency to talk to the press and to repeat his ‘Frontline' claims about Gallagher.

He would also admit that there was a ‘misunderstanding' about when the cheque was given.

That afternoon Gallagher was back to his campaign headquarters to prepare for a recorded interview with Matt Cooper of Today
FM
. He wrote a feature article for the following day's
Evening Herald
that would be headlined ‘I'm victim of Sinn Féin ambush for connecting McGuinness to killing' and began preparing for the live 6:01
RTE
news interview with Bryan Dobson.

On Today
FM
he was asked about his business dealings. Cooper was a former business editor of the
Irish Independent
, and he explained that the cheque for €82,829 from Beach House (which dealt with his income from speaking engagements and a Dragons' Den investment) that had first been treated as a loan to him was moved back into the correct account within four weeks when spotted by his accountants. It was an honest mistake by his bookkeeper's secretary. There was no breach of company law, he said.

Outside the shared Today
FM
and Newstalk offices, behind the St Stephen's Green Shopping Centre, he was doorstepped by Colm Keena of the
Irish Times
. Gallagher refused to answer his questions, referring them to his staff. Clearly angry, he said, ‘I am going to clear my name from a lie and a smear campaign from Sinn Féin. I was on national
TV
last night and I was accused of being a liar, and I am going to deal with this first.'

The following day Keena published a half-page article, ‘Gallagher: the issues', which included his business record, including the loans he had taken out of his company as a director, other draw-downs from the company, such as patent royalties, rent and director's fees, and the level of state support for his company.

He recorded Gallagher's denials, including comments by a corporate governance expert, Niamh Brennan, about a ‘bad vibe' about these aspects of Gallagher's record and Glenna Lynch's accusation that he had raided the coffers of his business. He claimed that everything he had done was above board and denied weakening his company by taking too much money out of it, saying it had survived because it was prudently managed.

The three other issues were his father's farm, patent and company income and the Louth County Enterprise Board.

 

The Higgins campaign bus was doing a sweep through the south-east with a stop-over in Gaelcholáiste Cheatharlach in Carlow. Then, with his wife at his side, it was on to Dublin for a final press conference at the Alexander Hotel in Fenian Street.

The Labour Party leader, Eamon Gilmore, and its candidate were ‘on message'. It was a two-horse race, and, perhaps sensing weakness in his opponent, Higgins took a second swipe at an increasingly beleaguered Gallagher. He said he had a clear policy difference with Gallagher in relation to job creation—a central plank in Gallagher's campaign. Higgins acknowledged that if he was elected he could not behave as he had when he was a minister, but he could be a source of inspiration at home while assisting in attracting foreign investment. ‘Now that's very different from saying one wants to elect an entrepreneur. I believe in entrepreneurship, but social entrepreneurship,' he said.

He went on to address both issues that were damaging to Gallagher. He admitted he was not an expert in the management of companies but said there appeared to be public concern about transparency. ‘The public anxiety should be fully satisfied. And that's important.' All candidates had to be ‘so fully transparent as to answer any question of trust and openness which people may put to us.' Asked about the ‘Frontline' programme, he admitted to being surprised about the manner in which McGuinness had raised allegations about Gallagher collecting a €5,000 cheque at a fund-raising event. ‘It is true to say that as it unfolded more detail was emerging, but I really don't want to get involved in labelling … All the questions should be answered.'

Gilmore was more robust. It's a two-horse race, he claimed, and the contest would be close in both first preferences and transfers. He reminded voters that Higgins was attracting support throughout the political campaign and, further appealing to any ‘soft' vote, he urged voters to switch their vote to the Labour Party, borrowing the Davis slogan, for a candidate who ‘would command respect at home and abroad.'

Hugh Morgan, the man identified by Gallagher in all but name, issued a statement the same afternoon. His company, Morgan Fuels, a sponsor of the Armagh
GAA
football team since 1997, owns more than four thousand filling stations in Ireland and Britain and continental Europe, including the Netherlands, Slovenia and Italy. The company also has a heating-oil business and has offices in Newry and Dundalk.

Morgan had surfaced in February 2011 before the general election when it emerged that he owned the building in Dundalk where Gerry Adams had his constituency office in his first tilt at winning office in the Republic. Asked at the time if he had any qualms about renting an office from a convicted fuel-smuggler, Adams replied: ‘It's a totally bona fide legal contract between Sinn Féin and the owner of the building. It's a short-term commercial lease. Sin é. That's it.'

A Sinn Féin spokesperson confirmed that, eight months later, Gerry Adams
TD
was still based in the Park Street premises and that a new lease had not yet been signed.

In 1998, aged thirty-eight, Morgan was given a suspended sentence when he pleaded guilty to charges of fuel-smuggling. The court was told he had paid £500,000 in excise duties and
VAT
owed on smuggled fuel. He was also ordered to pay £25,000 towards the costs of the prosecution.

In his statement, Morgan claimed that Gallagher had contacted him by phone, was invited to the dinner and asked for a donation.

He went on to say that on the night of the fund-raiser Gallagher introduced him to Cowen and that he had his photograph taken with him. ‘Approximately one week later Seán Gallagher called back to my business and gave me the photograph.' He also made the photograph available to the media.

He confirmed that he was convicted of tax evasion fourteen years previously in relation to fuel-smuggling in Northern Ireland. ‘As a consequence of that I have repaid the exchequer and paid a substantial fine. I was never investigated by
CAB
or any other agency in the Republic.' He added that his business was successful and employed more than eighty people in Ireland, North and South.

The figure of €5,000 was significant, as, according to the law, only donations of €5,078.95 or more have to be declared to the Standards in Public Office Commission. The donation, therefore, effectually remained secret.

RTE
's Six One news that evening led with the Gallagher, McGuinness and Morgan claims. Gallagher gave a recorded interview, broadcast as the lead item, claiming furiously that ‘this is political assassination'.

In the second half of the programme he was interviewed live in the studio. Bryan Dobson put the Morgan statement to him: ‘He said you phoned him up to invite him to attend this event and that he would then make a donation of five thousand euros to Fianna Fáil, that you visited him twice in his business premises and on one of those occasions he handed you over the cheque for five thousand euros. Is that the case?'

Gallagher replied: ‘This is part of the ongoing smear campaign that I have endured for over a week from Sinn Féin, and the point is that it culminated last night live on
TV
on ‘Frontline's' programme. Mr McGuinness made the accusation that I had visited Hugh Morgan's home after the event to deliver a photograph of the fund-raising event with the Taoiseach.'

‘Did you visit him on that occasion to deliver the photograph?'

‘No. What I stated last night—the accusation was that I visited his home after the event to deliver a photograph and I was given a cheque. Now, that's an absolute lie. When I challenged Mr McGuinness today he retracted that, but only following the fact that Fianna Fáil came out this morning, having checked their records, to show that the cheque was made out and lodged before the event took place.'

‘This is the man directly involved, Hugh Morgan, and what he's saying is that he indeed handed over the cheque in advance of the event, and he handed it over to you.'

‘And that's what he's claiming now, and this allegation arose last week as soon as I began to emerge in the poll.'

‘Is this the case or not?'

‘It is not the case.'

‘Can you be absolutely sure of that?'

‘Absolutely, because the night that Mr Morgan turned up to the event—and I didn't know Mr Morgan before the event—I was contacted by Fianna Fáil headquarters to invite some local business people. I invited possibly three or four. Mr Morgan was one of them, referenced by somebody else. He was the sponsor of the Armagh football team. I had never met the man; when he turned up on the night I didn't recognise him.'

‘Sorry—if you can be so emphatic that you did not visit his business premises and collect a cheque now, why were you not in a position to give that clear answer last night when this issue arose in the first place?'

‘Yes, let me clarify. This issue arose last week when I was asked did I collect a cheque before the event, which was the allegation last week. I clarified.'

‘Which is this—is the same allegation as tonight. Mr Morgan has been consistent in what he has been saying on this.'

‘No, what happened was, the allegation was levelled last week. The paper in question investigated and found that Mr Morgan had a criminal record and didn't go ahead with it. I clarified at that point that I had not met Mr Morgan before the event.'

‘Just to clarify, he had a conviction for smuggling.'

‘For fuel-smuggling, yes. He had also given his premises to Gerry Adams for his election campaign. I disputed that allegation, and it wasn't run. Last night it turned up in a different guise, where Mr McGuinness levelled these allegations after claiming that he had spoken to Mr Morgan two hours previously.'

‘What you said last night was that you had no recollection of getting a cheque from this guy.'

‘Correct.'

‘Okay, is it that you had no recollection—it might have happened but you can't recall—or can you say emphatically that you did not receive a cheque?'

Again Gallagher replied emphatically. ‘I did not receive a cheque from Mr Morgan.'

‘Why didn't you say that when you were asked it the first time around? Because the truth is generally fairly simple, isn't it?'

‘Well, here's the point. I made the point all along that I did not receive a cheque from this man before the event. Mr McGuinness then threw this at me last night, followed by a tweet from Sinn Féin to say that they were going to produce this man. I was shell-shocked that this was thrown in and that he was saying that I had delivered a photograph and collected a cheque, when I knew quite clearly, in my mind—'