ISLAMABAD, Dec. 31 (Xinhuanet) -- Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf Wednesday approved a constitutional bill aimed to end a power struggle, the Pakistan TV reported.

    Under the new law, Musharraf secures the power to sack the elected government and to dissolve the National Assembly, while hewill quit as military chief by December 2004 and will take fresh vote of confidence from the national parliament and provincial assemblies to make him remain as civilian president.

    The bill was passed by the Senate and the National Assembly on Monday and Tuesday, respectively, with support from the hardline Mutahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA), an alliance of six Islamic groups.

    The parliament has been paralyzed by protests from opposition parties including the MMA since Musharraf assumed wide-ranging powers in 2002.

    The major opposition, the Alliance for Restoration of Democracy(ARD) grouping the country's main opposition parties and some smaller parties, boycotted the bill and vowed to continue protest within the parliament.

    "We reject the constitutional amendment and consider it a blacklaw," the ARD chief Makhdoom Amin Fahim said Tuesday after the Senate adopted the bill. Enditem