By luck or by design, Zardari (in portrait, R) is steering a ship that is creaking, yes, but it is also inching out of the roughest waters of the recent past. — Photo by AP/File

Every silly season brings something new to the Pakistani political lexicon. This season it’s the minus-one formula.

The minus-one formula — calling it a formula adds gravitas and gives it an air of inevitability — is about getting Zardari, which, depending on the degree of antipathy a person feels towards the president, means ousting him from the presidency, or chucking him in jail, or chucking him in jail and throwing away the key, or sending him into exile, or putting him over the knee for all sorts of sins, real and perceived, committed.

Talk of minus-one has been floating through Islamabad and across the political classes of the country for a while now, but in this land of a thousand and one rumours, it was just another rumour that no one could pin down. Then Zardari’s acolytes gave it what it needed most, and us what we needed least — they denied that a minus-one formula is in the offing and decried the latest ‘attempt’ to sabotage the democratic project.

Official denials are the surest way to convert rumour into fact, and, sure enough, the political classes have erupted in a frenzy. Few seem to care about what should be the original, and perhaps only, relevant question: does the country need minus-one? Instead, the debate is all about the how — the method of implementing minus-one.

At some point though a rumour-fact collides with reality, and it has quickly become apparent that getting Zardari is easier said than done. Work your way down the list of ‘options’ and it’s clear enough why.

The judicial option? NRO or no NRO, the fact is Zardari hasn’t been convicted of anything yet and as president has immunity in fresh criminal cases. So hoping though as many people are that CJ Iftikhar and his band of non-PCO judges will act, the judges’ gavels are sheathed for now. Perhaps later, once Zardari is out of his office, they will get their chance — but that doesn’t really help the minus-one brigade right now.

The PPP? Perhaps, some hope, PM Gilani and the ‘real’ PPP will realise the folly of their ways and will ‘reclaim’ the party, egged on by a friendly opposition and the generals. An internal coup of sorts. But PPP 3.0 — Zardari’s PPP — shows no sign of those strains, despite the best attempts to drum up talk of internal dissent.

Gilani may not be the happiest guy in the world, overshadowed and made irrelevant as he is by his all-powerful boss, but that is beside the point. He was picked to be prime minister not because he’d happily acquiesce in his reputation being ground into the dust but because his pain threshold is high.

In this place of selectively short memories, the Gilani-as-saviour theory conveniently ignores the ‘who will be PM?’ debate after the February 2008 elections. Remember when Makhdoom Amin Fahim was dumped and Ahmed Mukhtar and Shah Mehmood Qureshi and sundry other candidates were bypassed? Gilani was picked for his ability to play second fiddle with equanimity, and 18 months later he’s unlikely to have undergone a sudden character transformation.

Could parliament impeach Zardari? A glance at Article 47 of the constitution should be enough to discard this theory. First, a majority in either the National Assembly or the Senate must submit a written notice of its intention to seek Zardari’s removal. Then, a two-thirds majority in a joint-parliamentary session must vote to impeach him. It ain’t happening.

Ah, but what about the backroom option? What about the generals? What about creating an atmosphere of crisis by, say, trotting out epic tales of alleged new corruption and throwing mud at Zardari’s inner circle? What about the Americans, whose fickle love for Pakistani democracy may cause them to cut Zardari loose if he becomes more a political liability than a useful ally?

The backroom option draws its strength from the perception that, outside Zardari’s inner circle, there appear to be two types of people in Pakistan. Those who regard Zardari with derision and want him out. And those who regard him with derision but worry about the consequences of removing, or trying to remove, him.

So drag the man into the mire of allegations and rumour-facts and perhaps the latter group will give up worrying about the system and acquiesce in bringing to an end a hideous chapter in the country’s tawdry political history. It is a clever strategy, but this cloak-and-dagger stuff suffers from a flaw at the moment — by luck or by design, Zardari is steering a ship that is creaking, yes, but it is also inching out of the roughest waters of the recent past.

The macroeconomic indicators have stabilised; inflation is down; the power crisis will ease now that summer is over; suicide bombings are down; a degree of normality is returning to Swat; Baitullah Mehsud is dead and his headquarters in South Waziristan is under siege; the judicial crisis is over; a truce, albeit an uneasy one, is holding in Punjab; the American demands to ‘do more’ against the Taliban are muted; drone strikes are less of a political hot potato; relations with India are edging towards a post-Mumbai phase; parliament is upping its legislative activity — it’s not quite singing-in-the-rain happy, but neither is it the nightmare that was Pakistan in 2007 and 2008.

Combine Zardari’s impregnable constitutional position with the cautiously optimistic outlook that the facts warrant, and it makes for a formidable argument against the minus-one brigade.

Of course, Pakistan being Pakistan, we wouldn’t be in the mess we are 62 years after independence if we weren’t experts at doing the wrong thing at the wrong time. And that’s why the minus-one formula has gained so much currency.Even so, perhaps the greatest danger to Zardari is Zardari himself. Running a country, especially a place like Pakistan, would test the strongest of wills and the most mercurial of minds. But for those who have known Zardari for long or seen him up close as president, some basic questions have yet to be answered. Does he understand what’s at stake? If so, does he care? And if so, does he know how to navigate the treacherous terrain of politics here?

The point is, Zardari may be safe from the minus-one brigade for now, but is he safe from himself?

cyril.a@gmail.com