KARACHI, Nov 20: All offices of the city government in the Civic Centre wore a deserted look on Monday as all employees vacated their rooms before noon, prior to the formal opening of the International Defence Exhibition and Seminar (Ideas-2006).

Official sources said due to security reasons a half-day off was declared and all employees were ordered to leave before noon.

District Coordination Officer Fazlur Rehman directed all officials to close offices before 12 noon on Monday.

The unannounced closure of the offices caused inconvenience to a number of citizens, who came to the Civic Centre from different localities of the city to get their official work done.

The sources said the decision to declare the half-day off was taken on the directives of security agencies as President Pervez Musharraf was due to visit the Expo Centre to inaugurate the Ideas-2006 later in the day.

They said no decision was taken to close the official business on Tuesday and, therefore, the city government offices were supposed to remain open the whole day. However, they hinted that in case of another visit of President Musharraf to the Expo Centre, the offices might be closed again by afternoon.