Former Irish athletics chief executive officer Mary Coghlan has denied there was anything abnormal about her appointment.
A complaint had been made by one of the other candidates for the position of chief executive of the Athletics Association of Ireland (AAI) that a member of the interview panel had a conflict of interest because he was chairman of an AAI finance committee and Ms Coghlan was also a member of that committee, the High Court heard yesterday.
To allay such concerns, the relevant member of the interview panel had stepped down from the second stage of the interview process, Ms Coghlan said. She was being cross-examined on the third day of her action against the association and the Irish Sports Council (ISC) over her dismissal in July 2009.
She also alleges she was defamed in comments made to an Oireachtas committee and that the ISC was guilty of misfeasance by putting pressure on the AAI to fire her.