For some, the prosecutor is a virgin in danger of being raped; for others, a whore requiring correction.

Czech politicians may now be split into two groups: Those who think the Olomouc state prosecutor, Ivo Ištvan, should be sacked for abusing his powers. And those who think he should be saved from politicians abusing theirs.

Petr Nečas, whose private life has become so entangled in the affair that his views are highly suspect, accuses the prosecutor of having fallen under the influence of an unnamed enemy on a witch hunt. He provides not a shred of evidence for this claim. Likewise Miroslav Kalousek.

Václav Klaus assures us that Miloš Zeman is definitely not behind the prosecutor’s ‘assault on the political system’ (did anyone ever say that he was, Mr. Klaus?), without providing any evidence whatsoever to support such a startling and definitive statement. His comments raise the previously unmentioned possibility that the head of state is indeed pulling the prosecutor's strings.

And Predator Zeman et al base the legitimacy of their power grab upon an apparently urgent need to guarantee that the prosecutor’s investigations will be free of political interference.

In short, the prosecutor has become a political football, a tool with which to play politics.

Setting aside the fact that all the political antagonists above belong to a tiny ruling clique that has barely changed since 1992, none of them even appear to want you and me to believe in the possibility that the independence of the state prosecution service is a firm reality almost a quarter of a century after the fall of communism.

You will argue that it is hardly surprising that politicians no longer believe in institutions that they themselves have colonised and debauched for so long. I agree. But this is no reason for the rest of us not to demand that they respect these institutions and the rules on which they are founded.

Over the last few weeks, running commentary supplied by presidents and government ministers alike (whether incoming or outgoing, elected or otherwise) all demonstrate a pronounced lack of faith in the robustness of this country’s institutions and especially in its law enforcement agencies.

Klaus and Zeman; Nečas and Pecina; Kalousek and Rusnok; Blažek and Benešová: Each pair has adopted an apparently opposing stance towards the prosecutor, the first critical, the second protective.

But their positions are two sides of one coin: For one camp, the prosecutor is presented as a virgin in need of a chaperone to protect her from being raped; for the other camp, she is a whore requiring correction and firm discipline.

Neither camp has thought it necessary to reassure us of the essential soundness of the system.

Of course, people resort to insinuation and character assassination when they lack evidence or are guilty, or both. And so far, insinuation and character assassination are all we have been offered.

Unless we are provided with some credible evidence that the prosecutor is a virgin in danger of being raped, or a whore, working to the orders of some malevolent pimp bent on destroying the country's parliamentary system, we would be wise to assume that he is neither. Or rather, that he is no better and no worse than he ought to be, a prosecutor doing his job, imperfectly perhaps but in good faith and against great odds.