U.N. chief remains ahead of other presidential hopefuls: survey

SEOUL, June 13 (Yonhap) -- U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon remained ahead of other potential presidential hopefuls from the opposition parties, data showed Monday, underscoring his presence as an odds-on contender in next year's presidential race.

According to the survey conducted by local pollster Realmeter, Ban held an approval rating of 25 percent, up 0.9 percentage point from a week ago, trailed by Moon Jae-in, former leader of the main opposition Minjoo Party of Korea whose rating stood at 24.1 percent, which also gained 0.9 percent from a week earlier.

Ahn Cheol-soo, co-chair of the minor opposition People's Party, ranked third with a rating of 12.4 percent, a gain of 0.5 percent. The uptick in Ahn's rating came despite an illicit political fund scandal involving a young member of his party for which he apologized last week.

The survey put President Park Geun-hye's approval rating at 37 percent, an increase of 0.8 percentage point from a week earlier. Her disapproval rating was tallied at 58.3 percent, down 1.5 percentage points.

Park's support rating slightly fell in the middle of last week as the government announced its plan to inject public funds for the restructuring of the shipbuilding industry. But reports of her fatigue from a 12-day trip to Africa and France pushed her rating up, the pollster noted.

Meanwhile, the ruling Saenuri Party's approval rating came to 30.1 percent, a decrease of 0.2 percentage point from a week ago, while the Minjoo Party recorded 28.6 percent, down 1.5 percentage points. The numbers for the People's Party stood at 16.2 percent, down 0.1 percentage point.

The weekly survey was conducted between Tuesday and Friday on 2,035 potential voters across the nation. Its margin of error is plus or minus 2.2 percentage points.

sshluck@yna.co.kr
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