Multiple mistakes have come to light as the “scandal” unfolds over Paul Wolfowitz, president of the World Bank, and the favors he granted to a bank employee who has been his longtime companion.

Mr. Wolfowitz himself made some of the missteps that have provided ammunition to the many bank staffers who had opposed his presidency from the start. The two large salary increases he engineered for his girlfriend, Shaha Ali Riza, as he arranged her transfer to the State Department, raised her pay to somewhat more than that of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

Earlier, in 2003, when he was deputy secretary of defense, the department directed a private contractor to hire Ms. Riza to consult on setting up a new government in Iraq. Some bank officials were puzzled by her subsequent briefing to the bank board, since the bank does not normally send its staffers to Iraq, although a Pentagon review cleared Mr. Wolfowitz of wrongdoing.

Bank officials themselves erred in asking Mr. Wolfowitz to arrange Ms. Riza’s transfer and pay hike. The matter could have been handled by other officials to resolve a perceived conflict of interest, whereas Mr. Wolfowitz’s direct involvement looked self-serving.

Other Wolfowitz mistakes included his reliance on several of his Defense Department colleagues whom he installed at the bank, stirring resentment by bank staffers who had to take direction from the newcomers.

In naming Mr. Wolfowitz to head the international bank, President Bush rewarded one of the principal architects of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, a drawn-out adventure increasingly opposed by many bank staffers and many of the bank’s member nations.

The nomination came after several Bush affronts to the United Nations and its agencies, including his effort to oust Mohamed ElBaradei as director general of the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency after tapping his phone calls to Iran.

So what could have been considered only a misdemeanor and dealt with by merely a reprimand has now brought many demands for Mr. Wolfowitz’s resignation, most recently by one of his two top deputies and dozens of the bank’s former top officials.

Still, with the continued backing of President Bush, Mr. Wolfowitz may hang on. While the 24-member executive board reflects the views of the member governments, whose finance and development ministers have expressed “great concern” over the bank’s crisis, they may hesitate to rock the boat by firing their president.

That drastic action could fuel demands for a change in the tradition of having the United States choose the president of the World Bank and European governments choose the president of its sister organization, the International Monetary Fund.

But whether Mr. Wolfowitz leaves or stays, the bank’s staff and much of the international community will remain concerned and resentful over the Bush administration’s war in Iraq and its general policies of unilateralism and preemptive warfare. That will be harder to fix.