Comment 3 for bug 516634

I can't remove gzip either:

 sudo apt-get remove gzip
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer required:
  locate texmacs-common texlive-font-utils
Use 'apt-get autoremove' to remove them.
The following packages will be REMOVED:
  file-roller gzip
WARNING: The following essential packages will be removed.
This should NOT be done unless you know exactly what you are doing!
  gzip
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 2 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
After this operation, 6,689kB disk space will be freed.
You are about to do something potentially harmful.
To continue type in the phrase 'Yes, do as I say!'
 ?] Yes, do as I say!
(Reading database ... 462930 files and directories currently installed.)
Removing file-roller ...
dpkg: warning: overriding problem because --force enabled:
 This is an essential package - it should not be removed.
Removing gzip ...
install-info: No dir file specified; try --help for more information.
dpkg: error processing gzip (--remove):
 subprocess installed pre-removal script returned error exit status 1
Processing triggers for menu ...
Processing triggers for man-db ...
Processing triggers for desktop-file-utils ...
Processing triggers for hicolor-icon-theme ...
Errors were encountered while processing:
 gzip
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)