Esat Digifone did not want to take back a £33,000 donation from Fine Gael because it would look as if the company had acted improperly, Mr Denis O'Brien, former Esat Digifone chairman, told the Moriarty tribunal.
Asked several times why Esat refused to take back the donation, when it was clear that Fine Gael did not want it, he said: "Because it looked as if we had done something improper, which was not the case."
The company had been asked for the donation so why would they take it back? Mr O'Brien asked. "Because the person didn't want it," Mr Coughlan replied. "You're not suggesting, Mr O'Brien, that you would force money on people if they didn't want it?"
"Well, Fine Gael were trying to force money on us," he replied.
According to a hand-written note by Mr Jim Miley, former Fine Gael general secretary, Telenor felt that taking back the money would make it seem as though the payment was "underhand or dirty".
Mr O'Brien said that, in the run-up to the award of the State's second mobile-phone licence, Telenor "made" Esat Digifone accept liability for the payment. "We were pushed into agreeing," he said. The tribunal saw a copy of a draft letter prepared by Mr O'Brien on April 7th, 1998, but never sent to Telenor because relations were strained between the companies at the time. The letter followed an attempt by Telenor to send the cheque back to Esat Digifone. Mr O'Brien wrote that the cheque could only be lodged to a Telenor account as it had been crossed "account payee only". "I did not request you to make a payment on behalf of Esat Digifone Ltd, rather I informed you of the fund-raising event in question and suggested that you might want to participate," Mr O'Brien wrote to Mr Arve Johansen, then chief executive of Telenor. "You agreed and did so. I subsequently learned that you had sought and obtained the reimbursement of your contribution from Esat Digifone and chose to make no objection in the interests of shareholder relations. As far as I am aware, Telenor has not done anything inappropriate in supporting the Fine Gael fund-raiser and I believe the cheque should be returned to Fine Gael, confirming the donation."
