ACT Teachers and Kabataan, parties under the Makabayan Coalition, each won a seat in the House of Representatives in the 2025 party-list elections. Rep. Antonio Tinio will serve as ACT Teachers representative, while Rep. Atty. Renee Co will serve as Kabataan representative.

Rep. Tinio and Rep. Co are among the winning candidates officially proclaimed by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) on May 19 as congress members in the 20th Congress. A total of 63 seats are currently allocated for representatives of winning party-lists.

“This victory is not only for teachers but for every Filipino fighting for the right to education, just wages, and genuine reform in the education sector,” said the ACT Teachers Party-list.

The teachers’ party expressed gratitude to all who supported and fought for the future of teachers, staff, children, and the nation. It called on everyone, “let us collectively continue the fight for genuine change and meaningful representation in Congress!”

For Kabataan Party-list, Rep. Co promised to work to advance proposed laws for education, employment, services, and the rights of the youth. During the campaign, the party highlighted what it called the youth’s 10-point agenda.

According to Rep. Co, “despite relentless vilification and cheating, we succeeded because of the Filipino youth’s activism.” During the campaign, and even before it, state forces carried out various attacks, harassment, Red-tagging, and other types of human rights violations against the Kabataan Party-list and its affiliates in the Makabayan Coalition.

“The nationally-coordinated red-tagging and smear campaign operations of NTF-ELCAC became more sophisticated with casket setups, harassment and abduction of volunteers, and deepfakes,” she said.

Despite these attacks, Kabataan won a seat along with ACT Teachers. In addition, 11 senatorial candidates from Makabayan received between half a million and 4.64 million votes. Makabayan parties Bayan Muna, Gabriela Women’s Party (GWP), and the winning ACT Teachers and Kabataan collectively received a total of 1.08 million votes.

GWP and Bayan Muna failed to secure seats in Congress. The Health Worker’s Party-list, representing health workers, also did not win a seat. “They cheated these parties, especially Gabriela and Bayan Muna,” GWP Rep. Arlene Brosas, who ran for senator under Makabayan, said.

Despite the loss, GWP stood firm in continuing its struggle for the rights and welfare of Filipino women. “Even if we are not proclaimed, the Gabriela Women’s Party will continue to push for truly pro-women and pro-poor bills,” said GWP Vice President Sarah Elago.

Meanwhile, the proclamation of Duterte Youth (three seats) and Bagong Henerasyon (one seat) remains pending after Comelec suspended both due to complaints and disqualification cases they are facing.

Comelec records show that 3.3 million were “overvotes” in the party-list during the last election. At least 15.4 million or 26.85% of all party-list votes were declared invalid or blank.