The public face of Ireland’s financial crisis until his party’s electoral defeat in February, Lenihan remained one of the country’s most popular politicians despite having to push through harsh cutbacks and tax hikes.
He combined one of the toughest jobs in Europe with his treatment for pancreatic cancer and his ability to retain his good humor, energy and sense of fun throughout endeared him to voters, colleagues, opponents and journalists.
Voters repaid his efforts at the polls when he was the only member of the Fianna Fail party returned to office in Dublin.
“Brian Lenihan faced events at a scale and a pace of magnitude that no other Irish minister has ever previously had to contend,” Michael Martin, Fianna Fail party leader said.
“When Ireland was in the eye of the storm, Brian Lenihan never faltered.
Once seen as a contender to lead Fianna Fail, the humiliation of having to apply for an EU-IMF bailout and his health put an end to such ambition.
“I have a very vivid memory of going to Brussels on the final Monday and being on my own at the airport and looking at the snow gradually thawing and thinking to myself: this is terrible,” Lenihan said in a BBC interview earlier this year.
“No Irish minister has ever had to do this before. Now hell was at the gates.”
The former lawyer and university lecturer took over the finance portfolio just as the economy began to unravel in 2008.
He delivered four austerity budgets in his less than three years in the job. He bailed out the two biggest lenders, nationalized the third and took charge of the two biggest building societies.
A scion of one of Ireland’s most famous political dynasties, Lenihan’s father was a former deputy prime minister and one-time presidential candidate. His aunt and brother served in parliament until electoral defeat in February.
Lenihan attended Belvedere college, James Joyce’s alma mater, and then studied law at Trinity College Dublin and Cambridge University.
