ISLAMABAD, March 22: All necessary preparations are afoot to hold referendum some time in May this year to get Gen Pervez Musharraf elected as president for five years.

Informed sources told Dawn here on Friday that the Corps Commanders Conference held in General Headquarters (GHQ), Rawalpindi on Monday last, had approved Gen Musharraf’s plan to become president for five years through a referendum.

Later, on Wednesday last, sources said, the issue was informally discussed in the cabinet meeting, although it was not on the agenda. The cabinet members endorsed the view-point of the corps commanders that the president needed to be in power for five years to ensure continuity of the policies about which foreign world specially the investors had been expressing their apprehensions.

“Foreign investors are quoting the statements of the politicians including Benazir Bhutto that they will reverse the reform process initiated by the present government”, a source said adding that assurances had been given by Gen Musharraf and Finance Minister Shaukat Aziz that nobody will be allowed to undo the reform process but still it was becoming difficult to satisfy the international donor agencies and the foreign investors over the issue.

Sources said that the new minister for law and justice Khalid Ranjha has been entrusted the job of working out various technical and legal details for holding the referendum — an issue that had been rejected by Alliance for Restoration of Democracy (ARD).

Eversince Sept 11 event occurred and US led coalition launched a full scale attack in Afghanistan to eliminate Al Qaeda men, the US and British governments felt comfortable to deal with President Musharraf. “And the initial response from Washington and London is encouraging to have a referendum for the president”, a source said. Chief of Pakistan Awami Tehrik, Dr Tahirul Qadri when contacted told this correspondent that during his meeting with the president on Thursday, the issue of referendum indirect came up.

“And my gut feelings that are that Gen Pervez Musharraf is willing to be elected as the president in a referendum through a popular vote”, he said.

He was asked why the chief executive seemed to be holding referendum and whether it will be a fair and free one or would be like that of late President Zia’s controversial referendum. “What I gathered was that this time there will be a different questionnaire for referendum”, he said hoping that all kinds of fears in this behalf will be allayed by the president and his government.

He said that the president believed that there was no foreign investment as the investors were seeking continuity of reform beyond October this year.

Dr Qadri, however, said that he could not say about the exact timing of the referendum and that this was to be decided by the government.