Jakarta – Public opinion surveys published here Monday suggest a majority of Indonesians support parliament's censure of President Abdurrahman Wahid, but were less eager for him to resign or be impeached.

A poll of 516 Jakarta residents by the leading weekly magazine Tempo, found 88 percent of respondents supported the February 1 censure motion, which followed a report implicating Wahid in two financial scandals.

The poll, noting a five percent margin of error, also found that 42 percent favoured a swift reply by Wahid, 30 percent supported immediate resignation, and only 20 percent were in favour of bringing forward a parliamentary session to impeach him.

Three quarters of the respondents felt that Wahid should be "suspended" if a legal investigation into the scandals is conducted.

All respondents agreed that Wahid should resign if proven guilty by a court of the scandals, with 58 percent believing the near-blind president should be punished.

Respondents to a separate poll conducted by Tempo's website Tempointeraktif.com and published in Monday's magazine were almost evenly divided on whether Wahid should resign or stay.

Of 1,251 respondents, 49.7 percent said they would accept an apology from Wahid instead of resignation. A slightly lower 47.9 percent would not accept an apology over resignation, while 2.4 percent were undecided.

A separate poll on the Tempointeraktif website found that of 526 respondents, or 75.5 percent believed the parliament was acting out of its own interests rather than for the people.

Meanwhile, of 1,106 respondents asked by Tempointeraktif what step should be taken to reduce political tension, 37.3 advocated that Wahid resign, while 34.9 percent favoured the dissolution of the opposition party Golkar.

Wahid has been under mounting pressure to step down and hand power to Vice President Megawati Sukarnoputri following the parliamentary rebuke.

The censure came after a 50-member parliamentary commission concluded that Wahid "could be suspected of involvement" in the embezzlement of some four million dollars in state funds.

It also charged that Wahid had been inconsistent in explaining a two million dollar donation from the Sultan of Brunei.

The commission's linking of Wahid to the scandals has been used by his opponents in the parliament, unhappy with his erratic style of governance, to seek his impeachment.