In Blake Edwards’ classic comedy The Party (1968), Peter Sellers plays Hrundi V. Bakshi, an Indian ham actor loose in Hollywood, a walking disaster. Until this week, I couldn’t rewatch the film without thinking of Joe Friggieri. But then came Konrad Mizzi. Again.

Move over, Joe. There’s Konrad now. He may not have your looks or your pitch-perfect Sellers imitation. But he still trumps everything you’ve got. He has authenticity.

We first see Bakshi during the filming of a battle, where he’s a bugler who’s shot and killed. Bakshi veers off script and keeps popping up to blow the bugle one last time. Each time you think he’s down for good, he pops right back up.

But that’s just the beginning. He accidentally blows up the stage-set. Bakshi’s name is meant to be written on a black- list but instead gets onto a guest list for dinner at a mogul’s mansion. Bakshi destroys that house too, but not before wreaking havoc on the host and dinner guests, one by one.

In the end, the police come to the rescue. I admit that’s where I may be stretching the compar- ison too far. Otherwise, it’s a perfect fit.

Who helped blow up Joseph Muscat’s stage-set fortress? Who keeps popping up just when you thought he was gone for good?

Who was pushed out of the Cabinet, only to pop up again in the same ministry, on almost double the salary? Who was supposed to be blacklisted from the Cabinet, only to turn up on a head of delegation list?

And who is wreaking havoc on the House of Labour’s A-list? Julia Farrugia Portelli had no chance of being taken seriously as tourism minister if she put up with Mizzi remaining at the MTA.

And what dignity would they have retained, the Cabinet ministers who pushed him out in November, if they put up with the consultancy contract he signed, behind their backs, a mere two weeks later?

The greatest damage has to be that inflicted on Robert Abela, however. We were supposed to believe Abela was his own man. That he had judgement. That he understood what it took to rebuild morale within Labour, confidence among the wider electorate, and Malta’s reputation abroad.

Mizzi’s nomination as head of the parliamentary delegation to the OSCE has been reversed. His consultancy contract has been terminated. But considerable damage has still been done.

First, the contract and nomination misjudge how reputation works. Yes, it’s built on details. But some details are more important than others. Mizzi’s name, as the only serving minister not to be sacked when found to own a Panama com- pany (“not even in Mongolia”), is one such detail.

Given the circumstantial evidence, there is no rational person in the world, who has heard of Mizzi, who does not believe he probably is corrupt to the teeth.

Mizzi went out the door, but came back in shortly through the window, on better financial terms

That includes international observers like the Council of Europe, the Group of States Against Corruption, and every reputable media organisation you can think of.

Unless a credible police investigation clears his name, officially nominating Mizzi to anything, let alone employing him, will come across as giving immunity to a crook. It would dominate attention and reduce the impact of any meaningful reforms – assuming reforms can be meaningful if Mizzi is spared proper investigation.

There is the added venom of putting Mizzi in charge of a delegation dealing with media freedom, among other matters. Mizzi was the minister who tried to oblige Daphne Caruana Galizia to reveal her sources (on the spurious claim that she was not a real journalist). Whatever next? Dracula to safeguard the rights of blood donors?

You couldn’t find a better way to incite the international media to keep harping on the Muscat government’s problematic relationship with the media. And you know what? No reasonable person could blame them.

Second, this week is a debacle for Abela with the Maltese public, which has realised that even when the government, back in November, was sending signals that it was responsive to the crisis, the public was actually being duped. Mizzi went out the door, but came back in shortly through the window, on better financial terms.

Abela might not have been part of it. He might just possibly not have known himself until the Times of Malta revealed Mizzi’s contract. All that does is make him seem not duplicitous but helpless or hamstrung.

It destroys the credibility he’s tried to build about being his own man. So much for the staged photo of Abela steering a boat with confidence. He has to start from scratch, this time under far more distrustful eyes.

Third, the whole affair damages Abela’s relationship with Labour supporters.

Wasn’t the problem, according to the official narrative, a few bad apples? Hadn’t the lessons been learned?

So why is Mizzi still around enjoying favour?

The nomination may have been withdrawn, the contract terminated. But what do the original decisions say about the people in charge? Mizzi was rewarded, however momentarily, when his behaviour has shown scant concern for the consequences for Labour’s reputation and morale. He surely knew the contract would eventually come to light.

Putting it all this way, it sounds like a bad week for the country, which inevitably suffers when its Prime Minister’s reputation suffers. So why compare the continuing Mizzi scandal to a comedy?

Because when a country begins to seem comic to observers, it’s in a worse state than when it’s seen to need desperate help. It means it’s at the point where people cease to take it seriously.

Is it too late for Abela to do anything to recover? No. But it does mean he needs to take action that shows, unambiguously, that he is his own man and not hamstrung by any backroom deals.

Let him have Mizzi expelled from Labour.

ranierfsadni@europe.com