It was not only the honourable course of action, it was both the right and necessary thing to do.

Premier Craig Cannonier’s resignation from office over his clumsy handling of the Jetgate matter has at least temporarily sidelined a meteoric political career which had once seemed full of boundless promise.

When he first emerged from the ranks of the Bermuda Democratic Alliance as potential leadership material, it was clear he possessed political star quality of the type which may only come along once a generation.

Charismatic and highly personable, Mr Cannonier could certainly never be accused of lacking in intelligence, drive or gravitas.

But he was still a political neophyte when he led the newly formed One Bermuda Alliance to its 2012 election victory, a Premier who lacked even the most fundamental grounding in Parliamentary procedure and political practice.

Such understanding can only be gained by experience, by being tested and hardened in the political arena over a period of years.

It’s not something a few months of on-the-job training can instil in even the most apt pupil.

Jetgate was not just a rookie error, it amounted to something considered far worse than a crime in political circles — a monumental and completely avoidable blunder.

A sideshow which was allowed to become the main event thanks to a year of unnecessary foot-dragging, Jetgate not only ended up fatally compromising Mr Cannonier’s credibility but distracting from the OBA’s overriding objective to revive a moribund economy and put Bermudians back to work.

When revelations about OBA ties to casino mogul and Washington DC power broker Nathan Landow first surfaced last May, the Premier had an opportunity to briskly draw a line under the entire matter.

But his personal explanation to the House of Assembly was, as subsequent events made clear, somewhat economical with the truth.

Either as a result of parsing the facts or deliberately misstating them, Mr Cannonier set in motion a chain of events which ultimately transformed a teapot tempest into the perfect political storm.

More likely a result of his political inexperience rather than any deliberately cavalier approach to the matter, Mr Cannonier ignored multiple opportunities to go back to the House and set the record straight over the intervening 12 months.

And the Legislature is the one place, comprised as it is of honourable men and women, where people might reasonably expect mistakes to be corrected and omissions remedied with the appropriate apologies and explanations provided.

As Mr Cannonier and his party have now learned to their considerable dismay, ethical shortcuts of the kind engaged in over Jetgate usually tend to lead to the unhappiest destinations under the customs and conventions of our political system.

In the end, though, nothing became him in office like the leaving of it.

Forthright, contrite and accepting full responsibility for his errors, Mr Cannonier’s decision to step down, while obviously personally wrenching, was both a principled and politically astute move.

His resignation amounted to the most public affirmation imaginable that the principles of accountability and responsibility which he campaigned on restoring to Bermudian public life apply to him as much as anyone else.

By stepping down he will help to end the ongoing haemorrhaging of Government credibility over an issue which could have been painlessly resolved a year ago while simultaneously rehabilitating his bruised reputation for moral integrity.

Indeed, it’s not impossible to imagine various scenarios in which, after strengthening the backbenches for a spell, he could be invited to join Cabinet in a senior capacity.

In the meantime, interim Premier Michael Dunkley’s first order of business must be to quickly bind the remaining self-inflicted Jetgate wounds and get Government back to the business of governing.

For the fact of the matter is that Mr Cannonier did not act in a vacuum.

Two other Cabinet Ministers implicated in the scandal have both indicated they will not resign of their own volition for their ill-defined roles in the affair.

They may well have logic and both the letter and spirit of the Ministerial Code of Conduct on their side.

But public sentiment is likely firmly aligned against them.

Bermudians, contending with the ongoing ramifications of a contracting economy and long-term unemployment and underemployment, are simply in no mood for Jetgate to continue into the indefinite future.

They want a resolution to this tawdry business, not an open-ended exercise in name-calling and finger-pointing between Government and Opposition MPs.

To bring about such closure, the new Premier may have to fire the Ministers in question — not a palatable decision, to be sure, but it could perhaps be the right and necessary one.