There is clearly something wrong with the logical sequence being employed by the government and its functionaries when it comes to the fresh calls for the Panama papers twins to resign over a magistrate’s ruling earlier this week.

We have said before that Minister Konrad Mizzi and the Prime Minister’s chief of staff Keith Schembri need to go after all that was revealed about their financial machinations and if they were to do so they would do the government, country and people they serve an enormous service.

That was three years ago and absolutely nothing happened to the errant duo. In fact, their positions were solidified and they and their lawyers set about ensuring that court proceedings have been used and abused, and delayed and waylaid, for years now as they pull out every trick in the book to delay matters.

But now comes the strange part. It was just before the 2017 election that the Prime Minister pledged that his chief of staff would step down if a magistrate finds there is enough evidence for a criminal investigation.

Now that has happened and still Muscat and his left- and right-hand men are still sitting their pretty pretending as though nothing has happened, that a Prime Minister does not need to stick to his word on a matter of such national import, and that they do not need to be held accountable for their actions.

The thing is that what with all the arguments about due process, human rights abuses derived from merely being reasonably investigated and political frame-ups, now that a magistrate has ruled that evidence must be preserved and investigated means that Mizzi and Schembri must step down without any further delay, and for them to make way for investigations to finally take place that would clear their names.

One would imagine that they are both itching to have an inquiry clear their name, for that is what any normal, guilt-free person would want done. But we are clearly not speaking about guilt-free people here.

Now to another point. The Prime Minister yesterday clearly acknowledged that this most recent magisterial decision, if anything, proves that investigations had always been ongoing and that there was no form of whitewashing taking place.

So if this whole business is already under investigation, what is the Prime Minister waiting for to cut the pair loose until they are proven innocent? And clearly, the fact that the Prime Minister acknowledges the investigations means he has known about them for some time, and that, by his own yardstick, Schembri and Mizzi should have stepped down a long, long time ago.

Now whether the new line of inquiry is fresh or whether it is an extension to the ongoing 17 Black investigation is irrelevant. What is relevant is that they are both under investigation for graft of the highest order and, according to the Prime Minister, they have been for some time now.

And as such, they should have stepped down a long time ago. But still the Prime Minister keeps insisting that his chief of staff’s business with 17 Black of alleged power station corruption fame is none of his business and that he saw no need to ask Schembri about 17 Black.

The Prime Minister may be called a great number of things, but a fool he certainly is not. And as such, he should not treat people as though they are fools.

The fact of the matter is that, with Monday’s ruling, the Prime Minister has been given a golden opportunity to try to set things right after all the embarrassment the Panama Papers has brought upon the country.

He can do this, and save face too, by taking this opportunity to cut Mizzi and Schembri loose after this latest ruling.

But judging from the PM’s attitude yesterday, he seems very unlikely to do so. But, in the meantime, perhaps Mizzi and Schembri will see the error of their ways, suspend themselves and seek to clear their names. And if they were to do so, perhaps they would also just maybe find the inspiration to hurry up those cases and get on with business. But somehow both possibilities appear to be rather far-fetched.