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Cristina Chi - Philstar.com
May 17, 2025 | 4:03pm
Voters look for their names in a registration list for the mid-term election at a polling station set up in a mall in Manila on May 12, 2025.
AFP / Jam Sta Rosa
MANILA, Philippines — About 242 million senatorial votes went unused in the recent midterm elections as the average Filipino voter only shaded seven to eight candidates instead of the maximum 12, according to the president of a public opinion research firm.
The actual number of those who "undervoted" or did not fill up all 12 senatorial candidates remains unknown, as the Commission on Elections (Comelec) does not release individual ballot data.
But the aggregate results, according to Cleve Arguelles, a political scientist and president of WR Numero, shows at least a third of the total maximum votes for senators were not used up.
Arguelles shared his estimations based on total voter turnout and the actual number of votes cast for senatorial candidates.
"I was running the numbers on the undervoting, and first of all, because we don't have exit polls, we are not sure," Arguelles said in an interview with ANC on Saturday, May 17.
"[But] if you run the numbers, there are 242 million generally wasted votes or unused votes," Arguelles said.
How was this computed? Arguelles said this is based on the maximum number of possible votes for senators (which is 688 million, taken from multiplying the 57 million voter turnout by 12) and the actual number of votes cast (some 428 million).
This leaves "about 1/3 or 37%" of unused votes, Arguelles added.
"What's coming out is that an average voter voted for seven to eight candidates. That's one of the things we're seeing if we look at the aggregate results," Arguelles said.
The Comelec earlier reported that exactly 57,350,968 or 82.20% of the registered voters participated on election day on Monday, May 12.
The poll body said this is the highest turnout for a midterm election in its history.
All 12 winners in the senatorial race were proclaimed on Saturday. Re-electionist and Duterte-allied candidate Sen. Bong Go emerged as the frontrunner with 26.91 million votes, followed by Bam Aquino with 20.89 million votes.
