Seoul, Aug 8 (IANS): South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol's disapproval rating has reached a record high of 70 per cent, as strong backlash against a proposed education policy added on to persistent concerns over high inflation and turmoil in the ruling party, a new poll revealed on Monday.

In the poll of 1,002 people conducted by Korea Society Opinion Institute (KSOI) conducted from August 4-5, 70.1 per cent gave negative assessments of Yoon's performance, up 1.6 percentage points from the previous week, reports Yonhap News Agency.

The President's approval rating continued to hover below 30 per cent, coming in at 27.5 per cent, down 1.4 percentage points from a week earlier.

In a separate poll of 2,528 people conducted by pollster Realmeter from August 1-5, 29.3 per cent responded that he was doing well on state affairs, down 3.8 percentage points from the previous week.

Those who gave a negative assessment rose 3.3 percentage points in the same period to 64.5 per cent, more than twofold of those who gave positive evaluations.

The pollster attributed the weekly decline to a number of factors, including Education Minister Park Soon-ae's proposal to lower the school entry age for children, a leadership row at the ruling party and persistent economic woes.

"It seems the school entry age plan sharply brought down the ratings among housewives whose favorability ratings had stayed above 40 per cent," said Bae Cheol-ho, Realmeter's senior analyst.

"On top of the ruling party and opposition parties entering an emergency system phase, an imminent economic crisis and a protracted Covid-19 breakout will heap pressure on Yongsan and the ruling party rather than the main opposition," Bae added, referring to the neighbourhood where the presidential office is located.

The analyst said Yoon's remarks at daily Q&A sessions, which had temporarily ceased during his holiday last week, will likely affect the poll results due out next week.

Appearing for one such session on Monday after the week-long vacation, the President said he contemplated on the months building up to his inauguration and pledged to uphold the will of the people.

Meanwhile, favourability ratings for the main opposition Democratic Party moved up 2.5 percentage points to 48.5 per cent, rising for the 10th straight week, while that for the ruling People Power Party fell 2.6 percentage points to 35.8 per cent.