FACT CHECK: Suspension of Duterte Youth, BH proclamation taken out of context

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A Facebook post implies that the poll body’s decision was a power tripping move, but the Comelec explained that the suspended proclamation was due to the pending petitions against the two groups

Claim: The Commission on Elections (Comelec) refused to proclaim Duterte-aligned party-list groups that won party list seats in the 2025 midterm polls.

Rating: MISSING CONTEXT

Why we fact-checked this: The post bearing the claim was posted on March 19, coinciding with the proclamation of winning party-list groups. As of writing, the post has already gathered an estimated 12,000 reactions, 1,800 comments, and 925 shares.

The post has sparked speculations among Facebook users and allegations that the Comelec favors other party-list groups. One user commented, “Halata masyado yang pamamalakad [niyo] makakaliwa kayo. Tingnan niyo number 1 Akbayan kasi si De Lima at Diokno [puro] NPA.” 

(Your move is very obvious that you are leftists. Look at the number 1, Akbayan, De Lima, and Diokno, all of them are [New People’s Army members].)

The post implies that the poll body is supposedly picking on party-list groups aligned with former president Rodrigo Duterte.

The facts: Comelec suspended the proclamation of the Duterte Youth and Bagong Henerasyon party-list groups due to pending petitions filed against them. 

Comelec Chairman George Garcia clarified that this does not mean that the two groups lost the elections. He said that the National Board of Canvassers decided to resolve the cases against the groups first before proclaiming them. 

He explained that it would be unfair to the said groups if the commission were to declare them winners and later remove them if their registration is canceled.

Duterte Youth won three seats while BH secured one seat in the May 2025 midterm elections.

Duterte Youth: The Duterte Youth party-list group faces at least two cases seeking the cancellation of its registration over alleged misrepresentation. 

In March 2025, election watchdog Kabataan Tayo ang Pag-asa (KTAP) revived its 2019 petition against the group, urging the Comelec to declare the registration of Duterte Youth void from the beginning, as it does not genuinely represent the youth sector. In its previous petition, the watchdog also said that Ronald Cardema, the group’s former first nominee and National Youth Commission chief, was too old to represent the youth. 

While the Comelec ruled in 2020 that Cardema was ineligible to sit in Congress as a youth representative, the petition seeking to cancel the group’s registration remained in limbo for over five years. (TIMELINE: The 2019 petition against Duterte Youth’s registration)

Bagong Henerasyon: Two days after the May 12 elections, lawyer Russell Stanley Geronimo also petitioned for the disqualification of the BH party-list group, accusing its representative and nominees of violating the Omnibus Election Code, particularly Section 261(i) for intervention of public officers and employees. 

The lawyer also accused the group of violating Section 261(o) on the use of public funds, money deposited in trust, equipment and facilities owned or controlled by the government for an election campaign.

In separate statements, Duterte Youth and Bagong Henerasyon slammed the Comelec’s decision to suspend their proclamations, calling it a grave injustice.

The Comelec divisions are still in a position to resolve the cases against the two groups before June 30, when the winners of the 2025 elections assume office. – Angelee Kaye Abelinde/Rappler.com

Angelee Kaye Abelinde, a campus journalist from Naga City, is a second-year Journalism student of Bicol University and the current copy editor of The Bicol Universitarian. She is a graduate of the Aries Rufo Journalism Fellow of Rappler for 2024. 

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