Mr Charles Haughey had a "first class" repayment record with the Agricultural Credit Corporation and never sought a write-off of his debt with the bank, the tribunal heard yesterday.
Mr John Hickey, who was deputy chief executive of the bank between 1981 and 1991, said the former taoiseach was a "very, very good borrower" and met all his repayment commitments.
He confirmed that special arrangements guaranteeing confidentiality, which were normally the preserve of senior ACC management accounts, were extended to Mr Haughey.
Mr Hickey said he kept Mr Haughey's files separate from others because "if there was any hint of a leak or anything like that it would be dynamite".
He also confirmed that the bank agreed to Mr Haughey's request not to register a chattel mortgage, a form of security, against his loan as this might have left the former taoiseach's finances open to public scrutiny.
Mr Hickey said the bank was happy to take Mr Haughey's "personal covenant" as security and felt Mr Haughey had the "moral responsibility" to ensure the loan would be repaid.
Mr Haughey first took out a loan with the bank in the mid1970s. It was in the form of a "stocking loan" to buy cattle and bloodstock. The loan was discharged in 1987 with the payment of £105,000 drawn from a Guinness & Mahon account controlled by Mr Des Traynor.
He said Mr Haughey met all the loan criteria and his "repayment record was absolutely first class. He paid everything. He never sought or alluded to a reduction in interest rates or a write-off of any description. He paid every single penny of interest and he paid every single penny of capital."
Mr Haughey's request for the bank not to register a chattel mortgage was recorded in a bank memo written by the then chief executive of the bank, Mr Michael Culligan, in October 1981. The memo, which was shown to the tribunal, recorded the former taoiseach saying "it would be an embarrassment" to register the loan in this manner "as it might attract the attention of media people and lead to undesirable publicity". The memo noted the bank agreement to the request, adding: "In effect then, we will be relying on Mr Haughey's personal covenant. In view of his political standing and his excellent repayment record with us, this should be adequate."
Mr Hickey said senior management would have had a certain amount of discretion over such matters. However, he could not recall any other individual having the registration requirement waived for privacy purposes.
Mr Hickey stressed that the bank had built up a certain amount of trust with Mr Haughey. "Maybe it was because of his position and the assets that I thought he owned at that time in Kinsealy, I never had any doubt in my mind that he would repay the loan."
He added: "There is another form of security and that is moral responsibility and I felt on his past record that he had the moral responsibility to make sure that it would be repaid, and it was."
