These were supposed to be the weeks in which the government’s popularity soared. The opening of the Mater Dei Hospital and the decision regarding the euro were supposed to have been among the most signal achievements of the current administration.

Instead of which the government now finds itself surrounded by broken promises and sinking in sleaze.

The Mater Dei Hospital, 16 years in the making and Lm250 million so far, has issues ranging from leaking roofs to vermin to the whole conundrum regarding the migration process from St Luke’s, let alone the other nightmare – what it will end up costing at full operational strength. It is a textbook example of how things can go wrong and how many things can go even more wrong.

The accession of the country into eurozone is an achievement, considering how high our inflation was not so long ago, and all the rest of our financial fundamentals but the real challenge is to see what spike of inflation the euro’s adoption on 1 January will bring with it, not in the immediate hours following New Year’s Eve but three, five months down the line.

There are other broken promises haunting the government. No sooner had the government boasted about the completion (Completion? With the last bit still in shambles and months away from resolution?) of the St Paul’s Bay Bypass than it was reminded that the work on the Regional Road bridges has fallen so much behind schedule there is no real timeframe for their completion. Perhaps next year? Perhaps.

Now all this could have been put right, even if at the expense of a red face or two. What the country was not prepared for was the spectacle of a government with scandals of all sorts erupting from within it, scandals not created or spun by the Opposition, but rather self-inflicted.

For to have hundreds of people skiving a course in naval practice and paying money instead without the scam being discovered until it had grown to colossal proportions shows the extremely unprofessional manner in which many of our public bodies are run, whether government departments or authorities.

Others have commented about the sheer casualness of it all, just like the background to what is known as the judges’ case: you pay, you cut corners, you get away with it.

But it’s the shambles at ADT that takes the cake.

Last week this newspaper said the whole affair is leading people to ask if Dr Gonzi is losing his grip. Nothing that has happened since then has militated against this judgement: on the contrary the whole issue as it continues to evolve is bringing out hitherto unsuspected defects of judgement in Dr Gonzi’s leadership.

There can be no doubt that with Mr Mugliett, formerly the big young hope for the PN’s future, Dr Gonzi has been far, far more lenient than he has been with, for example, people with the character and experience as John Dalli. But of course, Mr Mugliett never contested Dr Gonzi for the leadership of the party. Had Dr Gonzi kept his ear to the ground, he would have heard of the tantrums, the shouting and worse at the Transport Ministry and he would have known of the continuous haemorrhage of people from around the minister. Michael Frendo’s terrible experience in 1995 should have taught Dr Gonzi one thing one should be very very conscious of – that leaks in a pre-election year can be traced back to disgruntled ministerial assistants who take their secrets to the other side.

The whole issue of two staffers (How were they chosen? Was this another case of staff being taken in at the ministry – but their work is a cover for constituency work, something more common than we think and not just in Mugliett’s ministry?) who fall foul of the Law Courts and who get the young and inexperienced minister jumping through hoops to keep them in their job and doing what they used to do in his ministry, threatening him with moving to his rival in the constituency if he did not help them enough, is precisely what Dr Gonzi promised to eradicate from this country when he was elected.

Even worse than what Mr Mugliett did, or did not do, is Dr Gonzi’s very very surprising leniency in the face of it all and, worse, the way in which the government broke every rule in the book when tackling the issue.

Up till a month ago, this country still had a very high opinion of Dr Gonzi, not just that he is incorruptible and honest, but that he would not tolerate even the slightest whiff of sleaze around him. We now have fairly accurate reports he chewed Mr Mugliett in private but then concluded that while Mr Mugliett committed an “error of judgement”, his resignation was not accepted. How come? Ministers are precisely holders of political office for their judgement, not for any other ability they may have. If a minister commits an error of judgement that is precisely all the reason why time-out should be called for him.

The way the whole issue has been handled over the past week is, if it were possible, even worse news.

First the way it was leaked last Sunday to the usual newspapers as against making an announcement to the whole country. Not that this made things any better: on the contrary it showed an inept attempt at damage limitation that just did not wash.

Then the way, Dr Gonzi being away, that Minister Tonio Borg allowed the Opposition to fool him into 25 minutes of procedural nonsense at Question Time leaving hapless Mr Mugliett just three minutes in which to make his lame excuse, which had the Opposition and the country chortling ever since: how can “collectively” be not collectively?

Then by allowing the minister free rein to speak, write articles in the press, commit himself to an interview then getting out of it – in short, making a complete fool of himself and of the government he serves.

And lastly by the government, Prime Minister and all, refusing to tackle the issue, refusing to discuss it all, issuing late night almost incoherent statements, when with serenity and with equanimity anyone would have realised the whole issue had been mishandled and the only correction at this point is to go back to square one and start again, this time with no red lines whatsoever.