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President Yoon Suk-yeol adjusts his mask while listening to questions from the press while heading into the presidential office in Yongsan, Seoul, on Oct. 6. (presidential office pool photo)

Another survey released Thursday showed President Yoon Suk-yeol’s approval rating slipping to the 20% range.

According to a survey of 1,000 voters nationwide conducted by Embrain Public, Kstat Research, Korea Research International, and Hankook Research from Monday through Wednesday, 29% approved of Yoon’s job managing state affairs, while 65% believed the president was “doing poorly.” The survey had a confidence level of 95% and a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.

That puts the president’s approval rating down 3 points compared to poll numbers from two weeks ago, while disapproval rose by 5 percentage points.

This is the first time since the second week of August that positive assessments of Yoon’s state administration fell to the 20% range in a National Barometer Survey. A Gallup Korea poll released on Sept. 30 featured Yoon’s lowest approval rating since taking office, at 24%.

The respondents cited “lack of experience and ability” (36%) and the president’s “dogmatism and one-sidedness” (34%) as the main reasons for their disapproval. In particular, the number of respondents who selected, “dogmatism and one-sidedness,” increased by 8 percentage points compared to the preceding survey.

Party approval came in order of the People Power Party (34%), the Democratic Party (32%), and the Justice Party (5%). The gap between support for the People Power Party and support for the Democratic Party, which had been 5 percentage points in the previous survey, narrowed to 2 percentage points.

Approval and disapproval of Yoon’s job running state affairs are shown in the above graph, with approval in red and disapproval in gray. The date range runs from the third week of May through the first week of October.

Furthermore, 64% of the respondents said that the controversy over Yoon’s purported use of profanity during his overseas trip was a “diplomatic disaster caused by the president’s slip of tongue.” The figure is more than twice as high as the number of those who replied that the controversy was a “distortion by the media without confirmation of the facts” (28%).

However, among People Power Party supporters, 63% believed that the president’s comments had been misconstrued by the press, while only 28% believed there had been a diplomatic disaster.

Moreover, 59% of respondents characterized the presidential office’s response to MBC’s reporting on the hot mic incident as “an excessive response that stifles freedom of the press.” That was nearly twice the rate of respondents who believed that it had been an “appropriate response to false reporting that fed controversy.”

70% of respondents agreed that an apology by the president was necessary for laying the controversy to rest. Another 27% disagreed, with respondents identifying as conservatives agreeing (49%) and disagreeing (48%) at roughly similar rates.

By Lee Jung-ae, staff reporter

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