The approval ratings for the ruling and main opposition parties increased last week, while that of the new party created by Ahn Cheol-soo declined, an opinion survey showed Monday. 

The poll released by Realmeter showed the ruling Saenuri Party had a 40.6 percent approval rating. It marked the first time in six weeks that the rating has gone above 40 percent.

The main opposition Minjoo Party of Korea had a rating of 26.9 percent, recovering to its previous level from the first week of December, when Ahn broke away from the then New Politics Alliance for Democracy, the predecessor of the Minjoo Party, to create a new party. Ahn formerly served as co-chairman of the NPAD.

The approval rating of Ahn's new party dropped 4 percent from the previous week to 13.1 percent. The number has declined since the new party had its highest rating of 20.7 percent in the second week last month.

In the survey on Gwangju and Jeolla provinces, the stronghold of the main opposition party and Ahn's party, however, the Minjoo Party and Ahn's party gained 27.4 percent and 31.1 percent, respectively. But the gap between the rivals narrowed within the margin of error.

In its survey of Seoul and the surrounding area, including Incheon and Gyeonggi Province, the Minjoo Party far surpassed Ahn's party: 30.4 percent to 11.9 percent.

In a survey of presidential hopefuls, Moon Jae-in of the Minjoo Party, who recently quit the party chairmanship, remains the front runner with 18.8 percent, followed by Saenuri Party head Kim Moo-sung with 16.8 percent, Ahn with 13.2 percent, Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon with 9.1 percent and former Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon with 8.9 percent.

President Park Geun-hye's approval rating is 44.8 percent, a 0.7 percent rise from the previous week, with a disapproval rating of 49.6 percent, an increase of 1.0 percent.

The survey was conducted on 2,532 adults between Monday and Friday last week and had a margin of error of plus or minus 1.9 percentage points. (Yonhap)