Chilean president sees her approval ratings fall to record low of 22 pct

The approval rating for Chilean President Michelle Bachelet has tumbled of late, reaching as low as 22 percent, according to a poll published Friday by the country's Center for Public Studies (CEP).

When compared to a CEP poll in August when her approval rating stood at 29 percent, This is a seven percent slide. It is the lowest positive level for a sitting president since Sebastian Piñera scored 23 percent in November 2011. Furthermore, 61 percent of Chileans now say they disapprove of Bachelet as head of state.

Those with the best approval ratings are Marco Enriquez-Ominami, leader of the Progressive Party, with 42 percent, former president Ricardo Lagos with 41 percent, and Socialist senator Isabel Allende, with 40 percent.

Enriquez-Ominami's top spot is noteworthy since it was revealed that his 2013 presidential campaign received donations from Soquimich, a company owned by the son of former dictator Augusto Pinochet.

In the 2013 presidential election, which Bachelet won, Enriquez-Ominami languished in a distant third, with just 10.99 percent of the vote.

Lagos, Bachelet's predecessor from 2000 to 2006, has seen his approval ratings climb since indicating that he might seek to return to the presidential office. Though he holds no current government position, he has been the UN Special Envoy on Climate Change since 2007.

Just 31 percent of those polled now believes Bachelet has the leadership skills to face crisis situations, while 62 percent think she does not.

These statistics are not an aberration as they are very similar to the last monthly poll carried out by polling company Adimark. Enditem