TOKYO, Dec 18 (bdnews24.com/Reuters) - Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda's support rate has plunged to around 30 percent, according to a poll released on Tuesday, a result likely to embolden the opposition to pressure Fukuda to call a snap election.

Support for Fukuda's cabinet fell 13 percentage points from a previous poll in October to 33 percent, while 44 percent of respondents said they do not back his cabinet, up 14 points, according to the survey by the Mainichi Shimbun newspaper.

Political analysts say a support rate of at least 30 percent is crucial for a government to stay in power.

The Mainichi said the government's mishandling of public pension records, and comments from Fukuda that appeared to play down the fiasco, were apparently behind the drop in his support.

The poll also showed that a majority of voters do not back a Japanese naval mission supporting US and other ships patrolling the Indian Ocean in search of terrorists and drug runners.

Fukuda has vowed to resume the mission, which Washington says is vital to its war on terrorism in and around Afghanistan, but opposition parties are against it and the mission has been suspended since its mandate expired on Nov. 1.

Fifty percent of respondents in the Mainichi poll said the mission should be terminated, while 41 percent said it should be resumed.

The lack of strong public support for the government and for the naval mission is likely to give the opposition more grounds to adopt a rare censure motion against Fukuda in the upper house if the ruling bloc were to force the bill into law by using its large majority in the lower chamber.

The opposition parties that control the upper house have said they would vote down a bill to restart the mission, but Fukuda's ruling coalition last week extended the current parliament session by one month to ensure its passage.

The main opposition Democratic Party has said public opinion would determine whether it resorts to the non-binding measure, which would put pressure on the prime minister to call a snap election.

"It has to be meaningful. If we submit it and it is ignored, that would be a minus," a Democratic lawmaker said recently.

Ruling party officials have stressed that the motion would not be binding, suggesting that Fukuda might ignore it.

The parliament's extension until Jan. 15, decided by a lower house vote, gives the ruling bloc enough time to use its majority in the more powerful lower house to force the bill's passage.

The ruling parties can override a rejection by the opposition-controlled upper house with their two-thirds majority in the lower chamber, but only after an upper house vote or a waiting period of 60 days after the initial lower house approval.

The Mainichi poll is in line with other recent media surveys showing Fukuda's support declining amid growing discontent over the government's handling of a public pensions crisis and a defence procurement scandal.

The government admitted last week that it might never be able to sort out some of the 50 million public pension accounts found earlier to have been mishandled by officials, while Japanese prosecutors last month arrested a former top defence official over suspicions he took bribes from a former defence contractor.

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