Commission on Elections (Comelec) Chairman George Erwin Garcia says the May 12, 2025 mid-term polls has been the most peaceful so far in terms of figures on election-related violence.

This was in the context of the 128 incidents of election-related violence tallied in 2019 and more or less 120 in 2022. As of the press conference on Monday, May 12, Garcia said that they have recorded 44 incidents of election-related violence.

"It still is the lowest in the three elections that we had," Garcia said.

"So what we are saying is, if that is the basis, then perhaps the election is peaceful," he added.

Garcia also stated that when it comes to the declaration under red category, there are currently 34 areas declared under it. Compared to 2019 amd 2022, this year's polls appear to have the lowest in this category.

"But however, we would like to be honest and frank. Regardless as to whether it is lower or even greater or even of the same number of election-related violence, but still there are violence," he stated.

"And therefore, an election marred by violence is to us not acceptable as a conduct of election. There's still a lot of things to be done, a lot of learning matters to be enhanced, simply because an election is never perfect," he added.

Throughout the day, Garcia said they had to replace a total of 311 Automated Counting Machines (ACMs). The poll body has 16,000 contingency machines on standby.

The issues, according to Garcia, were the ACM itself, the ACM cover, ACM scanner, ACM screen, ballots, manual audit, operational concern, procedural, smart card, thermal cutter, thermal paper, thermal printer, and USB device.

"Compared to the 2022 elections, during the first few hours of voting already 2,500 machines were replaced but here, in all fairness, only 311 were replaced," he said.

Garcia also stated that they never encountered any problems in the final testing and sealing (FTS) of the machines for the May 2025 polls. But in 2022, the poll chief said that a total of 2,000 machines had problems.

"Kung 311, ikumpara sa ating 2,500 naman nung mismong araw ng election nung 2022, di hamak na maliit naman po yan (If it's 311, compared to our 2,500 on the actual election day in 2022, that’s significantly smaller)," he said.

"Again, hindi sila nagkaproblemang nasira. Kung hindi, ang ginawa ng Comelec yung binigay nating instruction kanina, wala na tayong pakialam whether one time, two times na nga-reject yan ng machine. Basta tanggalin na yan, palitan na ng bago (Again, the machines themselves didn’t break down. What the Comelec did was follow the instruction we gave earlier — we no longer care whether the machine rejected the ballot once or twice. Just remove it and replace it with a new one)," he said.

Hours after voting, based on the Comelec's website, a total of 76,160 or 81.55 percent of local Election Returns (ERs) have been received by its server out of 93,387 poll returns expected to be received.

On the other hand, 118 ERs or 48.76 percent have been received out of 242 poll returns expected.