The DUP's ill-conceived in-out ministerial strategy is unravelling before our eyes, with the public focused more on this misguided tactic than the supposed point of principle the party claims it is upholding.
It is quite clear the DUP felt bounced into taking a hardline stance after the Ulster Unionist Party withdrew from the executive in the wake of the despicable murder of Kevin McGuigan and the PSNI's assertion the IRA was involved.
After trying, and failing, to get support for the suspension of the Assembly, Peter Robinson announced that he would step aside as first minister and all other DUP ministers, apart from Arlene Foster, would resign their positions.
Since then we have had the pantomime of ministers being re-nominated and then resigning in order to stop other parties taking these key roles.
It is a bizarre set of circumstances which would not be tolerated in any other democratic process.
It wasn't long before the cracks were beginning to show with on-off health minister Simon Hamilton pilloried for abandoning his post while patients face unacceptable delays in treatment.
Attempts to defend the minister's absence appear to boil down to an insistence that the health service can function without him, a risky argument likely to rebound on the DUP.
Further evidence that the DUP is showing contempt for the public came yesterday when the Irish News revealed that ministers are still being paid for the hours between reappointment and resignation, despite the party claiming otherwise.
The DUP tied itself in knots trying to explain the contradictory messages being sent out by elected representatives, who variously claimed they were not getting paid, were getting paid but using the money for their constituency or were getting paid but had given the money back.
Eventually the party said it has had discussions with the Assembly finance authorities ``about not only stopping future payments but also the repayment of any payments previously made.''
It is not clear when those discussions took place but there was nothing to suggest it was in the four weeks since ministers began resigning.
Indeed, the Assembly earlier yesterday said it had no approaches from any ministers about arranging repayment.
On top of that we had confirmation - again at odds with earlier information - that ministers were continuing to avail of their official cars while briefly in office.
It is little wonder that the public gets disenchanted with politics when they see something that should be relatively simple become mired in confusion and obfuscation.
The DUP had every opportunity to sort out ministerial financial arrangements and to tell people what they were doing.
Instead of transparency and openness, they have got themselves into a complete mess with the focus now on damage limitation.
The question is, what else are we not being told?
