The Makabayan bloc said their movement is still a strong force in the Congress despite only gaining two party-list seats in the 2025 midterm elections based on official count by the Commission on Elections (Comelec).

In a press conference at the Makabayan headquarters in Quezon City on Thursday, ACT Teachers Rep.-elect Antonio Tinio said they are still a strong presence due to the mass movement that supports them.

“Even if our numbers are lessened in the Congress, we still have the mass movement behind us. Our voices will not be diminished, and we will continue bringing social issues to the Congress. It isn’t a matter of quantity,” Tinio said.

Only Kabataan Partylist and ACT Teachers Partylist are posed to secure seats in the 20th Congress.

With women’s sector party-list Gabriella winning a seat in the incoming 20th Congress still unsure, Gabriella Rep. and senatorial candidate Arlene Brosas said that they are frustrated with the election results.

“When Gabriela is out of the Congress, there won’t be genuine representation of women, children, and the LGBT community in Congress,” Brosas said.

The Makabayan bloc reiterated their call for manual counting of votes, calling out the lack of transparency in election results due to issues of overvoting, ballot rejection, under voting, and machine sensitivity experienced by voters during the election.

“We have a pending bill in Congress on hybrid voting, where manual counting will be conducted at the precinct level and electronic transmission will be used to forward the results to the canvassing committee. We want to see transparent counting in the precinct level,” ACT Teachers Rep. and senatorial candidate France Castro said.

Makabayan also called out the incidents of red tagging faced by the organization from state forces, that the Commission on Elections (COMELEC) failed to address.

“No other political force has faced such intensity of attacks from the state as enabled by the military, police, and other state forces, and as amplified online,” Renee Co, Kabataan party-list Rep-elect, said.

“The Comelec’s resolution on red tagging is just lip service. They are siding with the red taggers even if we have evidence,” Makabayan president and senatorial candidate Liza Maza added. Yzabela Velez-White/DMS