Why has President Kuchma called the referendum?

He accuses the leftist-dominated parliament of blocking his plans for market reforms. He says the vote is crucial to unlocking new loans from the International Monetary Fund, winning a debt restructuring agreement with the Paris Club of creditor nations and ending eight years of post-Soviet economic decline.

Mr Kuchma's spokesman, Olexander Martynenko, says the main goal of the referendum "is to form efficient structures of state power." Kuchma made increasing his power over parliament and combating corruption among the main planks of his campaign for re-election in November 1999.

Why does the opposition object?

The powerful leftist group in the assembly has accused President Kuchma of seeking dictatorial powers and wanting to set up a puppet parliament. The Communist Party has called for a boycott of the referendum saying that it would strip the country's parliament of its independence. Communist Party leader Petro Symonenko, a long time foe who lost to Mr Kuchma in the November election, accuses the government of bowing to the dictates of the International Monetary fund.

Even some members of the majority - including the majority coordinator, former President Leonid Kravchuk, parliamentary speaker Ivan Plyushch and deputy speaker Viktor Medvedchuk have expressed opposition to the referendum as a whole or to specific questions.

What is the background to this clash?

The country's blighted economy is the real backdrop to what has been a long-running feud between President Kuchma and parliament since he was elected in 1994. The economy has been in crisis since the collapse of the Soviet Union and sporadic reforms have failed to halt the decline. Poverty is now widespread and workers frequently go unpaid for months. The referendum is intended to end the conflict between the executive and the legislature which has blocked economic progress. There have also been widespread allegations of corruption among parliamentary deputies.

Are there precedents in other former Soviet republics?

Yes. Russian President Boris Yeltsin used a referendum in 1993 to increase his constitutional powers over a leftist-dominated parliament and Belarussian leader Aleksander Lukashenko used one to dissolve the Assembly in 1996.

What has been the reaction of the US and Europe?

The Council of Europe, the continent's leading human rights body, has condemned the referendum as unconstitutional and called for it to be postponed. It criticised the transparency of the collection of signatures which approved the calling of the referendum. It complained that the signatures could not be verified.

A visit by US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright on Friday would appear to lend support to Mr Kuchma in his battle with parliament. Washington has identified Ukraine as one of its top foreign policy priorities this year. A senior US official said ahead of the visit that Washington viewed the legislature as a "perennial problem" when it came to reform and that the parliament should give the government a chance.

What do the voters think?

Opinion polls show voters back three of the questions - cutting the number of deputies, removing their right to immunity from prosecution and empowering the president to dismiss the assembly. But they showed little support for the fourth question on creating a second chamber to represent the country's regions. Amidst the economic gloom, though, apathy is widespread.

BBC Monitoring, based in Caversham in southern England, selects and translates information from radio, television, press, news agencies and the Internet from 150 countries in more than 70 languages.