MONTREAL — A Quebec public inquiry may be sliding swiftly into the realm of fiasco, with key players challenging its relevance including a main witness who doesn't want to testify.

Premier Jean Charest recently called a probe into allegations that his party bagmen had been calling the shots when it came to naming judges in the province.

The inquiry appears to be losing the support of key players: first the star witness whose allegations prompted the probe, and now the official Opposition has been told it can't participate.

Inquiry head Michel Bastarache refused a request from the Parti Quebecois to have official status in the hearings. That means its lawyers cannot question witnesses at the hearings the same way Conservative and Bloc Quebecois party lawyers did at the Gomery commission into the federal sponsorship scandal.

At the same time, Bastarache announced Wednesday that not only would that official status be granted to the governing Liberal party, but also to the premier as an individual.

He also granted official status to the Quebec Bar Association. He said the decision was based on a sound reading of jurisprudence.

"I am convinced that the Quebec Liberal Party has a direct and important interest in the commission's work," Bastarache wrote in a statement.

As for the official Opposition: "(I) consider it not desirable to grant either the status of participant or of intervenor to the official Opposition."

That decision drew the ire of the PQ, which said Bastarche failed to understand that the Opposition had a role to play in the hearings.

Now they're calling the whole commission into question.

"It's very hard today for us, as well as all Quebecers, to continue to have confidence in this commission and to not ask what all the millions of dollars to be spent will serve if it's only to allow Jean Charest to save face," said Veronique Hivon, the Opposition justice critic.

When he announced the probe, Charest's opponents called it a diversionary tactic to draw attention away from a bigger scandal involving corruption between politicians and construction companies.

They howled again upon learning that the commission's chief lawyer, Pierre Cimon, had been a donor to the Liberal party. He eventually resigned.

This week the key witness in the whole affair -- former justice minister Marc Bellemare, who made the allegations about judges -- announced he wouldn't testify.

He said he didn't believe the inquiry could be partial because its head, former Supreme Court justice Bastarache, worked at the Heenan Blaikie law firm which had deep financial ties to the Charest government.

Bellemare also cited cabinet confidentiality rules as a reason he wouldn't testify, saying he couldn't betray confidences gained while he was a member of the government.

Charest has agreed to waive the oath of secrecy for Bellemare. The premier was asked whether he could also lift secrecy rules for the rest of his cabinet, and hinted he might.

"We will take all necessary steps so that the commission has all the information necessary to do its work," Charest told a news conference Wednesday, standing next to Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty.

The PQ suggests the inquiry is pointless if the main witness won't testify. Even before receiving the news her party had been rebuffed, Opposition Leader Pauline Marois called into question the pertinence of the entire exercise Wednesday.

The premier called the inquiry after Bellemare, his former justice minister, said he was pressured to name certain judges at the request of Liberal fundraisers.

He said he raised his concerns with Charest at the time and that the premier ignored him.

The premier denies the claim and has filed a $700,000 defamation suit against Bellemare.

Immediately after Bellemare made the claim, Charest called an inquiry. That move confounded critics who have spent nearly a year demanding a probe into allegations of deep-rooted corruption related to construction contracts.