Tribunal witnesses confused over Athlone"s geography

Athlone"s unique location - split by the Shannon with half in Connaught and half in Leinster - has the potential to cause confusion. This was rarely more evident than in testimony given to the Mahon tribunal by former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern and developer Owen O"Callaghan last week. On Tuesday, September 16, Mr Ahern was the first to slip up on his knowledge of the Athlone area. Discussing the tax designation awarded to the Golden Island Shopping Centre, which is in county Westmeath, he stated its progress has been held back in the mid-90s, 'because there was a dispute... about the location of the site and while officials in the Department of the Environment felt that it did fall within the urban renewal because it was slightly on the other side, the Connaught side as they call it, that there was a dispute on that.' The mistake of verbally moving Golden Island into Roscommon was repeated by Mr O"Callaghan during his time in the witness box on Friday, though the Cork developer did state that he wasn"t fully sure on the issue. 'I"m not 100% certain of this, but apparently there is a Leinster section of Athlone and there is a Connaught section of Athlone and we were putting the shopping centre in the section that Mary O"Rourke was not in, I think it was the Connaught section,' he said.