How to secure public accountability for alleged questionable financial dealings that are outside the State’s jurisdiction but involve State assets? The unfolding Project Eagle controversy has exposed the difficulties involved as public disquiet continues to mount following a succession of damaging revelations.
The €1.6 billion sale in 2014 to US fund Cerberus of the Northern Ireland loan book of the National Asset Management Agency (Nama) is being investigated by numerous authorities. These range from the US Securities and Exchange Commission and the UK National Crime Agency to the PSNI and the Stormont finance committee.
Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin joined other Opposition parties at the weekend in calling for an inquiry into the Cerberus sale. This follows an Irish Times report that the Comptroller & Auditor General (C&AG) had identified "shortcomings" and "irregularities" in the Project Eagle transactions.
The C&AG’s review is due for publication tomorrow after consideration by the Government. He is believed to have concluded that Nama may have lost “hundreds of millions of euro” by the manner of the sale of the Northern Ireland portfolio. Nama is expected, in turn, to strongly contest this finding by challenging the assumptions on which the C&AG has based his calculations. The disagreement on property valuations is the main focus of the C&AG’s report.
However, there are other disquieting aspects, not least a BBC Spotlight programme last week which broadcast a covert recording of a meeting between Frank Cushnahan, then a member of Nama's advisory committee in the North, and John Miskelly, a Co Down property developer, in which the latter was heard handing over £40,000 to Mr Cushnahan. Allegedly, this was to secure his assistance in helping the developer to refinance his Nama loans. Mr Cushnahan has denied any wrongdoing.
As the Government seeks to respond to public unease, political momentum is building – however reluctantly – towards an official inquiry. But in adopting such an approach, the Government will have to set out how it believes matters that are largely outside the State's jurisdiction, and at the centre of a police investigation, can be successfully elucidated. First Minister Arlene Foster has already ruled out a cross-border inquiry.
Nama has remained characteristically abrasive in its response to the Project Eagle controversy; slow to address the issues raised and dismissive of public concerns.
The agency's offer of a private briefing to Public Accounts Committee vice-chairman Alan Kelly before it attends a PAC meeting on September 22nd was inappropriate and was rightly rejected. Nama must be made more accountable, transparent and responsive to valid public unease. Its appearance before the PAC would be a good place to start.