Project Eagle: Nama can no longer count on political cover

The Government’s decision to order further investigations into Project Eagle, the sale by Nama for €1.6 billion of its Northern property loans, is first a recognition of political reality.

Though few people in Government really want to open yet another inquiry, recent weeks - and further revelations - have brought them to the realisation that they have no real option but to sanction an inquiry into the Project Eagle sale.

The view in Government Buildings, shared by the Taoiseach, is not that an inquiry is desirable, but that it is politically inevitable.

Even if the Government was not dependent on the Independents within the administration and Fianna Fáil outside it, the political momentum towards an inquiry would be enormous. With the Government dependant on these two groups, both anxious to demonstrate their influence, the momentum is unstoppable.

Minister for Finance Michael Noonan has been resisting this inexorable progress towards an inquiry since it was first mooted. Even two days ago, at the Fine Gael think-in in Co Kildare, he was stressing that the first place for further inquiries was at the Public Accounts Committee (Pac).

Only after that process, he suggested, would there be a case for considering a further, perhaps judicial, inquiry.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny, on the other hand, had already recognised that some sort of a legal or quasi-legal inquiry would be necessary. Mr Kenny was also acutely aware that the Independents and Fianna Fáil would flex their muscles on the issue.

The Government statement issued after its meeting today skirts around these divisions. It does not commit to a Commission of Inquiry, or to any sworn judicial inquiry. But it acknowledges that “further investigation” is required, and specifically that the Government has “its own responsibilities” in the matter.

In other words, the Project Eagle investigation can’t be left to the Pac to deal with it. The question is what sort of an inquiry it will order, rather than whether one will take.

Focus will now move onto the Comptroller &Auditor General’s report itself. Nama will try to rebut its findings. But the absolute cover that Nama has enjoyed from its political masters has been breached.