Ireland‘s leader emphatically denied he was drunk during an interview Tuesday morning after commentators took shots at his tired-sounding responses to questions over the nation’s economic health.
“That’s ridiculous,” Prime Minister Brian Cowen said of the accusations. “It’s not true at all.”
The controversy started when Simon Coveney, the transport spokesman for the rival Fine Gael party, tweeted that Cowen “sounded half way between drunk and hungover and totally disinterested” in his interview with Irish broadcaster RTE.
From there, Coveney’s Fine Gael colleague, finance spokesman Michael Noonan hammered Cowen as well.
“I was listening to the interview,” Noonan said. “He was certainly a man who was coming at the interview after a very late night.”
Cowen’s response to the political pounding: “That’s uncalled for.”
Members of Cowen’s party, Fianna Fail, rushed to his defense, admitting Cowen was hoarse, but fit for the job.
Fianna Fail is currently holding a conference in Galway, fueling rumors that late-night carousing led to Cowen’s lethargic on-air talk.
The underlying tensions behind the criticisms are Ireland’s deficit and troubled banking system.
Cowen is planning massive budget cuts, which could doom his party’s slim majority in parliament as it faces reelection by 2012.
