Although it was a long and winding road, no one familiar with how the Lumbee Tribal Government operates expected a different ending.

The fix, we can assure you, was always in.

It wasn’t a surprise when the tribe’s Supreme Court on Tuesday overturned a decision made a day earlier by the Board of Elections that found Paul Brooks was ineligible to run for a third term as tribal chairman, ending a conversation that had carried on for months even as it lacked any real suspense.

The Board of Elections, in making its decision, cited previous rulings that defined a term as beginning when an elected official takes office, but the Supreme Court managed to contort itself enough to determine that different standards apply to what defines a term for a council member and a term for a tribal chairman.

Lumbee law supposedly forbids an elected official from serving more than two consecutive terms, except, apparently, when it is inconvenient for those who thirst for control. On Dec. 31, Brooks will have served a one-year term and a three-year term, but no matter. The court said that Brooks should have been allowed to run for a three-year term in 2011 when Purnell Swett resigned the chairmanship, and that the Board of Elections erred in limiting that term to the time that Swett would have served if he had fulfilled his term.

So the court figured Brooks was being cheated out of a couple of years.

This is a fun fact about the court’s decision: On Nov. 17, Brooks will be running for a two-year term while his opponents will — presumably — be running for a three-year term. So far, Harvey Godwin and Lynn Bruce Jacobs have filed for the chairmanship, and more candidates are likely. Of course, the more the merrier for Brooks as additional candidates will just further dilute the vote of Lumbees who are tired of this circus and its ringleader.

And once again the tribal government has made itself the butt of the joke — which helps explain why the turnout for the Nov. 17 election will be abysmal, clearing the path for Brooks’ re-election. There are a lot of well-paid employees whose jobs at The Turtle depend on Brooks being chairman, so expect those folks to be motivated on Election Day.

Our prediction is about 95 percent of the Lumbee Nation won’t bother to cast a ballot.

They don’t see the point — and try as we might, we can’t come up with an argument to convince them that their vote and what they want in governance matter to their self-anointed leaders.