ISLAMABAD, March 24: The Election Commission has not been intimated of the government plans for holding presidential referendum, a high official of the Commission told Dawn.

“We are only reading about it [referendum] in the newspapers. As far as we are concerned, we have not been intimated of any such plan,” the official said.

Asked not even unofficially, the official said, “neither officially nor unofficially. We are busy making preparations for the general elections to be held before Oct 12, 2002.”

The Election Commission is presently working over-time to complete the delimitation of the constituencies and would unveil the new constituencies on March 26.

No government official is on record of saying that government has decided to hold referendum. But at the same

time the government did not deny the claims made by the politicians who after meeting the president attributed him saying that he planned to hold referendum prior to general elections..

Sources said that government, has deliberately leaked the feeler to make assessment. People at the top are apprehensive that if the turn out was low, it would erode its credibility.

The government, sources said, is fully cognizant of the damage which late Gen Ziaul Haq had suffered due to holding of referendum.

The political analyst said that Gen Ziaul Haq had the firm backing of religious lobby to whom he promised to enforce “Nizam-i-Mustafa”.