KABUL — President Hamid Karzai took a step toward fulfilling his pledge to hold Afghanistan’s presidential election on time, as officials said Tuesday that the vote had been officially set for April 5, 2014.

If the date holds, it would avoid a repeat of one of the first in a series of controversies to mar the last presidential election, originally set for May 2009. That election was delayed until August, which pushed Karzai a few months past the official end of his constitutionally mandated five-year term.