Opposition leaders in Pakistan are demanding the country's elections go ahead on Jan. 8, after officials recommended the vote be pushed back several weeks following Benazir Bhutto's assassination.
Former prime minister Nawaz Sharif warned of street protests if the government delayed the election.
"We will agitate," he told The Associated Press. "We will not accept this postponement."
The Elections Commission confirmed Monday that it had recommended delaying the parliamentary polls in the wake of Bhutto's assassination last week.
However, the official decision wasn't to be announced until Tuesday, said CTV's South Asia Bureau Chief Paul Workman, reporting from Islamabad.
"We were all waiting for a decision this afternoon, but the election commission essentially asked for reports from the various regions of the country to see whether they could in fact go ahead with the election on the 8th," Workman told Canada AM.
"And now they've put off their decision until tomorrow, but we understand that they have recommended to the Pakistani government that there be a delay of something like 4 to 6 weeks.
The commission hasn't specified how long the delay would be, though there are reports the vote would be held off for between four and six weeks.
Meanwhile, an unnamed senior government official made his own prediction that the vote would be on hold for "six weeks or so as the environment to hold free and fair elections is not conducive," The Associated Press reports.
The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to disclose the information, AP reports.
Further complicating the tension in the troubled region was the release of video footage of Bhutto's assassination by suicide bombing that raised questions about the government's version of what took place.
Though she was killed in a suicide bomb and gun attack, there is disagreement over the exact cause of her death, with the government and her supporters providing conflicting versions.
The new footage, which was obtained by Britain's Channel 4, appears to show Bhutto being shot by a man with a handgun just before an explosion rocks the car she was travelling in.
However, the government's version is that Bhutto was killed after the shock from the blast slammed her head against the sunroof of the car.
Bhutto's family and supporters claim she was shot to death.
The discrepancy has some calling for a full inquiry into how she was killed, but her husband Asi Ali Zardari said late Sunday he would not allow an autopsy.
Successor
Bhutto's son has been named her successor as head of the Pakistan People's Party -- but the real power will likely lie with her husband, named co-chairman.
"The party's long struggle for democracy will continue with renewed vigour," Bilawal Zardari told a news conference in Naudero, his mother's ancestral village.
"My mother always said democracy is the best revenge."
Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Benazir's father, founded the party in 1967, making Bilawal the third generation of Bhutto to become leader. Bilawal will adopt the Bhutto surname.
The Bhutto political dynasty extends back four generations, and Benazir Bhutto made clear in her will that her son should succeed her.
"It wasn't a very democratic selection," Workman said. "In fact, Benazir Bhutto asked, decided, disclosed that her husband should lead the party, and her husband apparently then said I want my son to become the chairman and I'll be the co-chairman."
Bilawal, only 19 years old, would not even be able to enter the Pakistan parliament until he turns 25, Workman said, describing him as a "boy king."
However, one observer says Bilawal's bloodline is more important than his age or political experience.
"He's above all a Bhutto, very conscious of the family tradition, family name as it were," Akbar Ahmed, former high commissioner of Pakistan to Great Britain, told Canada AM.
"He will emerge very quickly you'll see that, you saw in his first ever press conference a certain confidence. The Bhutto name does carry this kind of personal charisma, arrogance, charm, confidence."
The United States, Canada and some other western countries want Pakistan to press on with elections, even though Bhutto's killing left her party leaderless.
Calm returning to Pakistan
Meanwhile, the country appeared to be emerging from the turmoil that followed Bhutto's death, with riots leaving at least 44 people dead.
Soldiers and police were still on patrol in many areas, but Karachi, the city where the worst of the violence took place, was quiet.
Monday saw major losses for the Karachi Stock Exchange on the first day it re-opened after Bhutto's assassination. The 100-share index had plumetted by 4.7 per cent at noon local time.
The drop marked one of the benchmark stock market's largest single-day falls.
With a report by CTV's Steve Chao
