Army-picked Thai PM's popularity drops further

BANGKOK, Feb 5 (Reuters) Thai Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont's popularity has fallen below 50 per cent for the first time since he was appointed in the aftermath of a September 19 military coup, an opinion poll said today.

The slump in the administration's popularity was due to its preoccupation with pursuing graft investigations against ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, rather than trying to solve the country's problems, the poll showed.

Surayud, a former army commander-in-chief and adviser to revered King Bhumibol Adulyadej, won 48.2 percent support compared with 70.5 per cent in November, Bangkok's Assumption University, which conducted the national poll last month, said.

The poll interviewed 4,334 people.

''People feel the government is focusing too much on tackling corruption in the previous government than to address the real problems from falling farm prices to rising household debt to drug dealing,'' chief pollster Noppadon Kannika told Reuters.

The army cited ''rampant corruption'' as one of the main reasons for its removal of Thaksin, winner of landslide election victories in 2001 and 2005.

A graft-busting panel set up to probe alleged wrongdoings committed by Thaksin, his cabinet ministers and their families has failed to produce any concrete evidence.

Half of respondents said the government was not doing enough to resolve farmers' problems, such as a shortage of agricultural land and falling produce prices. Three in 10 said corruption had not been resolved.

Bombs on New Year's Eve that killed three people also caused half the respondents to question whether the government could ensure their safety.

Nobody has been charged in connection with the blasts, which are being blamed on Thaksin loyalists or Muslim militants from the far south, home to a three-year separatist insurgency.

REUTERS AKJ DS1416