Pakistan's president winning second term in national referendum

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- Gen. Pervez Musharraf moved toward winning five more years as Pakistan's president in a nationwide referendum Tuesday, although the apparent low voter turnout could weaken his authority in cracking down on Islamic extremism.

Musharraf, who came to power in a bloodless 1999 coup, hoped for a high turnout that would lend him a stamp of legitimacy, but Pakistani voters seemed largely to ignore the referendum.

Opposition political parties criticized the referendum as unconstitutional but lost their legal effort to prevent Tuesday's vote. Then they called for a voter boycott.

Still, few people expected Musharraf to lose. Final results from the 87,000 polling stations around the country -- some of them in prisons and gas stations -- were not expected before Wednesday.

Information Minister Nisar Memon predicted a voter turnout of about 30 percent, down from the 38 percent in the 1997 general elections. More than 60 million people were eligible to vote.

"Most of the polling stations in the province remained deserted throughout the day," Maulana Fazle ur-Rehman, a prominent pro-Taliban cleric in the deeply conservative southwestern Baluchistan province, said in a statement.

Very early returns showed Musharraf advancing toward an overwhelming victory.

With 429,780 votes counted from 708 polling stations six hours after polls closed Tuesday night, 345,427 ballots supported extending Musharraf's term. Only 9,774 opposed it. The rest were ruled invalid.

Before the referendum, the government-run Election Commission relaxed voting rules and even did away with registration lists.

The referendum was seen as an attempt by Musharraf to cement his grip ahead of October's parliamentary elections. Opposition parties challenged the referendum on grounds that the president normally is elected by parliament, but the Pakistan Supreme Court declared the referendum legal.