A referendum on the Islamisation policy

Zia-ul-Haq's Islamization

On December 2, 1978, General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq delivered a nationwide address on the occasion of the first day of the Hijra calendar. He did this in order to usher in an Islamic system to Pakistan...

 of President Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq

Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq

General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq , was the 4th Chief Martial Law Administrator and the sixth President of Pakistan from July 1977 to his death in August 1988...

was held in Pakistan

Pakistan

Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

 on 19 December 1984. Voters were asked whether they supported Zia-ul-Haq's proposals for amending several laws in accordance with the Koran and Sunnah

Sunnah

The word literally means a clear, well trodden, busy and plain surfaced road. In the discussion of the sources of religion, Sunnah denotes the practice of Prophet Muhammad that he taught and practically instituted as a teacher of the sharī‘ah and the best exemplar...

, whether they wanted this process to continue, and whether they supported the Islamic ideology of Pakistan. The referendum also served as way of extending Zia-ul-Haq's presidential term by five years. It was reportedly approved by 98.5% of voters, with a turnout of 62.2%.

Results

Choice	Votes	%
For	21,253,757	98.5
Against	316,918	1.5
Invalid/blank votes	180,226
Total	21,750,901	100
Source: Nohlen et al.