Parliamentary Elections, 12 May 2025

On 12 May 2025, the Philippines held mid-term general elections for 12 of 24 senate positions and all 317 seats in the House of Representatives (as well as local authorities). Members of the Senate are elected by a direct, simple majority voting system; members of the House of Representatives are chosen through a mixed system—around 80 per cent by first-past-the-post in single-member districts, and up to 20 per cent through party-list proportional representation for marginalized and sectoral groups (with a two per cent vote threshold and a three-seat cap per party). The Commission on Elections (COMELEC) is comprised of one Chairman and six other commissioners (IFES 2025; Laoc et al. 2025).

On polling day various issues were noted such as vote-buying, violence (including intimidation of journalists), technical delays and unequal playing field in state media (EU EOM 2025). The election also happened amidst a heatwave, with temperatures in many parts of the country over 42 degrees Celsius. One individual passed away from the heat after casting their ballot (Garcia 2025). In Tulunan, Cotabato province, six people collapsed while queuing to vote in temperatures of 37 degrees Celsius; nationwide, the Red Cross recorded heat-related incidents affecting 11,531 people (Laoc et al. 2025).

The Philippines uses an Automatic Counting Machines (ACM) in their election process. Due to the heat, some areas reported that some machines stopped functioning properly (rejecting ballots) due to the heat (AFP 2025). The ink from the ballots would not dry, making it difficult for the machine to read the ballots and causing delays (AFP 2025; Sy Cua 2025). The errors in the machines also required the staff to stop processing ballots to clean or fix the machines. The COMELEC Chairman said that all the machines are precinct specific and that a ‘contingency machine’ would be sent to affected areas (Depasupil-Franco and Barona 2025).Power interruptions were also cited as a reason for delays in voting (Garcia 2025). 

Electoral violence remained commonplace, with at least 30 candidates and election officials being killed in this election cycle—much of it related to the local contests that ran concurrently. The Philippines National Police reported 111 election-related incidents of violence across the country. One of the heaviest hit regions with a long history of electoral violence was the Bangsmoro Autonomous region, where the Basilan province disaster office reported 11 election-related deaths (EU EOM 2025). 163,000 police officers were deployed to secure polling stations, operate checkpoints and escort election officials throughout the country (AFP 2025). 

The EU Election Observation Mission witnessed at least five instances of vote buying through goods and cash. The issue is endemic in the Philippines; COMELEC received over 400 complaints about vote buying this election. Many complaints centre around the partisan distribution of welfare payouts (EU EOM 2025). 

The two predicted candidates (Marcos Jr and Sara Duterte) for the 2028 presidential election between them backed almost all candidates contesting the senatorial election. Rodrigo Duterte, former Filippino President, was reelected as Mayor of Davao while out of country, being on trial at the International Criminal Court (Head 2025).

Turnout was 83.4 per cent, which is similar to the 2022 parliamentary elections (83.83 per cent) (International IDEA n.d.). 

Innovations

In 2024, COMELEC shortened the time frame in which political parties could withdraw or substitute  candidates—from November to October 2025. The reason behind this was to prevent the use of placeholder candidates whereby a party would campaign with one person and then make a substitution near election day. (IFES 2025). 

Piloted during the 2022 elections, satellite registration points (the Register Anywhere Programme) were expanded during this election using locations such as malls, universities, prisons and church organizations to allow voters to process their registration outside their home municipality. Those turning 18 between the end of the voter registration period and the election were also allowed to register (EU EOM 2025).

Special voting arrangements were made for elderly, pregnant, and disabled citizens. For the first time, these groups had access to early voting hours (between 05:00 and 07:00) as well as reserved during regular hours (Odong 2025; EU EOM 2025). Improved emergency medical preparedness was introduced by a new partnership between COMELEC, the government and the Red Cross, partly in recognition of increasing heat-related risks. Voting in shopping malls, though not new, proved critical in mitigating these risks (Laoc et al. 2025).

Online voting for some citizens residing abroad was also offered fore the first time—namely in the US and the Caribbean, with technical support and voter assistance provided for the 30-day voting period (Philippine Embassy 2025).