MANILA - PHILIPPINE President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo is the most unpopular leader in the country since democracy was restored in 1986, the country's leading pollster said on Friday.

The Social Weather Stations (SWS) agency said Mrs Arroyo registered a net satisfaction rating of minus 38 in a poll in the last week of June.

Results of the survey were published in BusinessWorld newspaper.

It said only 22 per cent of the 1,200 respondents were satisfied with Mrs Arroyo's performance while 60 per cent said they were dissatisfied.

BusinessWorld quoted a palace spokesman as saying the low ratings were a result of high fuel and oil prices, which could not be blamed on the president.

'The survey coincided with the global crisis of having high prices of oil and food,' said spokesman Anthony Golez.

'A lot of people are mistaken in blaming the government for it when it is something no Filipino can stop, not even the president.'

Annual inflation in June was at a 14-year high of 11.4 per cent.

Mrs Arroyo is the only president since strongman Ferdinand Marcos was deposed in 1986 whose satisfaction rating has slipped into negative territory, SWS said. Her previous worst was a minus 33 rating in May 2005.

Despite a persistently poor showing in opinion polls, Mrs Arroyo is not seen in any danger of losing office. She was voted to power in 2004 for a six-year term.

She is supported by the military and her allies dominate the lower House of Representatives. Although the Senate is controlled by the opposition, the powerful Catholic church is also by and large in Mrs Arroyo's favour. -- REUTERS