On the day that the Church celebrated the feast of the Three Wise Men, the Prime Minister’s changes to the Cabinet were not the perfect example of wisdom.

But it’s not because the decisions were not made with the right intentions, or that, in different circumstances, they would not have enabled the government to really concentrate more on the core issues at hand, as Dr Lawrence Gonzi himself explained at last Friday’s press conference.

The lack of wisdom shown was in the fact that Dr Gonzi failed to foresee that whatever options he went for, he was going to make the situation worse for himself and for the government – unless, of course, he appointed Franco Debono as Justice Minister.

After Friday, Dr Debono has moved on from a position of no support to the government – as he did with his abstention in the confidence vote on Minister Austin Gatt – to one of outright opposition, as he has said he will vote against the government when the time comes.

With a one-seat majority in Parliament, the government’s future appears rather bleak, although the Prime Minister seems convinced that he will manage to complete his term in office, and has ruled out going for a vote of confidence in Parliament. Yet this conviction is somewhat premature, seeing that Dr Debono has never wavered from the position that he took.

The Ghaxaq lawyer may tell the whole world – and take oaths to that effect – that what he did was out of principle, and not as a way of being given a ministerial job. But before the reshuffle – and now even more after the comments he made following the changes announced – it could be seen from miles away that he was seeking personal glory.

The thing is, Dr Debono went about fuelling his move up the political ladder the wrong way, and he never stood a chance of being given the portfolio he craved. Not in a million years, the Prime Minister must have told himself over and over again.

Dr Gonzi had already tried to control the situation by appointing this MP as his parliamentary assistant, a move for which Dr Debono was apparently not grateful, considering the way he has treated his own leader. Had Dr Gonzi given Dr Debono what he wanted, the Prime Minister would have made a fool of himself and would have appeared weak.

If Dr Debono has lost confidence in Dr Gonzi and the government he leads, he should pack up and leave Castille. By staying there he is contradicting himself. How can he continue to act as an assistant to the PM when he has publicly said so many bad things about him? He should also resign his seat – those who voted for him have turned against him – and make way for someone who is more loyal to the party.

Dr Gonzi insisted that the Cabinet reshuffle was not sparked by the Franco Debono factor, but by the need for him to shed the extra responsibilities he had by elevating two parliamentary secretaries under his wing to the rank of minister. This, he said, will enable him to focus all his attention on the economic situation and the generation of jobs at this delicate time the country is facing, together with the rest of Europe.

This may be true, but only in part. I think that, following the changes, the PM will have more time for more important matters, but I do not believe that he would have gone down the reshuffle road 14 months before an election if Dr Debono had not threatened to withdraw his support unless the Justice and Home Affairs Ministry was separated.

Where the PM was wrong was in his thinking that such a move – which he camouflaged by other changes here and there to readjust ministries and responsibilities – would silence Dr Debono. So it would have perhaps been better to maintain the status quo and call Dr Debono’s bluff.

Before last Friday’s long political day, I was sure that if the Justice and Home Ministry had been sorted out with the split advocated by Dr Debono, the Nationalist MP would have found some other way of grabbing the headlines – as he did before Christmas 2009, last November on the Arriva issue, and more recently on the party financing legislation.

So, unless he was made minister, a move that – as I explained earlier – the Prime Minister never intended to make, there was no way that Dr Debono would have stopped pushing the limit.

My gut feeling was confirmed barely an hour after the Prime Minister addressed the media at Castille last Friday. Dr Debono was on the warpath as he had never been before – and that’s already saying something – calling the PM “arrogant” (look who’s talking) and saying that Dr Gonzi should resign.

Dr Debono did not stop there, but later went on to bring other Cabinet members into the equation, expressing a kind of personal viciousness that is hard to understand, but which continues to reveal the true motives behind this lawyer’s behaviour. The way he attacked the new Cabinet members after their appointment last Friday completely removed his mask.

It could be that Dr Debono has realised that his previous shenanigans have taken him to the point of no return. He knows that his political career is over; he knows that the Nationalist Party will never allow him to stand on its ticket again. And so he wants to bring down everyone with him.

He will be remembered by all Nationalists as the one MP who caused the most trouble to the government of which he forms a part. What he is doing is giving his former school-mate Joseph Muscat the chance to become Prime Minister earlier than the Labour leader expected.

And people will not give two hoots about what the two men achieved in the classroom they shared, but which one made it to the top, and which one shot himself – and his party – in the foot.

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