President Lee Jae Myung's Approval Rating Dips Slightly After Two-Week Rise, Poll Shows

SEOUL, Oct. 5 (Yonhap) -- President Lee Jae Myung's approval rating fell slightly last week following a two-week rise, a poll showed Monday.

In the poll conducted on 2,515 adults nationwide from last Monday through Friday, positive assessments of Lee's job performance stood at 37.4 percent, down 0.5 percentage point from the previous week, Realmeter said.

Negative assessments also dropped 0.3 percentage point to 59.8 percent, while 2.8 percent of respondents said they were unsure.

Lee's approval rating had risen for two consecutive weeks, helped by his clarification of key political issues during a press conference on Sept. 18.

"The announcement of livelihood and welfare policies using excess tax revenue served as a positive factor this week. But personnel, security and livelihood-related negative factors appear to have had a greater impact," Realmeter said.

Negative factors included a controversy over the establishment of new investigative agencies -- the Serious Crimes Investigation Agency (SCIA) and the Prosecution Service -- and the appointment of the SCIA chief, as well as the recent land mine blast inside the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), diplomatic friction with Ukraine and concerns over housing rental prices in the Seoul metropolitan area, it noted.

In a separate poll conducted on 1,009 voters nationwide last week, support for the ruling Democratic Party (DP) stood at 42.5 percent, up 3.8 percentage points from the previous survey, while support for the main opposition People Power Party (PPP) fell 1 percentage point to 38.4 percent.

The survey on the president had a margin of error of 2 percentage points at a 95 percent confidence level, while the one on political parties had a margin of error of 3.1 percentage points at a 95 percent confidence level.

Both surveys were commissioned by the EKN newspaper.