LIMA, Sept 22 (Reuter) - President Alberto Fujimori's popularity has plummeted after his government took over a television station that broadcast critical reports on Peru's security forces, opinion polls showed on Monday. Two new surveys showed Fujimori's approval rating sliding 13 and 15 percentage points, mainly on the government's move against Lima television channel Frecuencia Latina -- in the hands of pro-government minority shareholders since Friday. Pollster Datum Internacional showed Fujimori's approval rating at 30 percent, while a University of Lima survey gave him 32 percent, both down from around 45 percent in August. The University of Lima poll, which did not give a sample number, said only 19.8 percent of people would vote for Fujimori if an election were held tomorrow, compared to 40 percent for the popular Lima mayor Alberto Andrade. A third survey by pollster Apoyo said nearly seven in every 10 Peruvians believe phone-tapping is a "habitual" practice of the government against politicians, businessmen, and journalists. Frecuencia Latina's report on phone-tapping, allegedly by state security agents, was the prelude to the government's first lunge against the channel. Hours after the report aired on July 13, the channel's owner, Israeli-born businessman Baruch Ivcher, was stripped of his Peruvian citizenship. The government said it revoked Ivcher's nationality because it discovered administrative "irregularities" he committed when he applied for citizenship in 1984. Under Peruvian law, foreigners cannot own local media, which was why courts authorized the channel's minority shareholders, Samuel and Mendel Winter, to take control Friday pending appeals from Ivcher. Although officials say the case is a purely judicial matter between independent businessmen, the takeover was widely perceived in Peru and abroad as a government-inspired effort to silence the channel's allegations of abuses by Fujimori's security services. Those accusations, which also include claims of corruption and torture, had helped dent Fujimori's traditionally high popularity ratings in recent months. The Apoyo poll of 512 Peruvians and the Datum survey of 209 both put Andrade ahead of Fujimori as election favorite, by 20 and six percentage points respectively. All the polls had a margin of error of between three and five points. Fujimori has won two general elections, and it is unclear if he will stand for the next presidential vote in 2000. Responding to a wave of criticism that has cast them as government lap dogs, the Winter brothers published a statement in local media Monday insisting on their independence. The new administration of Frecuencia Latina "will not answer to the interests of its share participation in the company, but will take into account the interest of the whole society", the statement said. Local media have almost unanimously condemned the Frecuencia Latina takeover. The U.S. State Department expressed its "concern at the potential corrosive effect this action will have on freedom of expression in Peru", according to an embassy statement. ---- Con las Masas y las Armas, Patria o Muerte ... VENCEREMOS! MRTA Solidarity Page - http://burn.ucsd.edu/~ats/mrta.htm