section_path: Background
section_name: Background
paragraph_text: Background
  
  In the 2022 election, the UniTeam, backing the candidacies of eventual president Bongbong Marcos and vice president Sara Duterte, won a plurality of seats in the Senate of the Philippines. Leading up to the opening of the 19th Congress, Cynthia Villar and Migz Zubiri, both having run under UniTeam, were viewed as the frontrunners to succeed Senate President Tito Sotto, who left the Senate after being term-limited. After Zubiri presumptively earned enough votes to be elected Senate president and negotiations for a term-sharing agreement failed, Villar withdrew from the contest, leaving Zubiri unopposed for the Senate presidency.
  
  Zubiri's term as Senate president was marked by speculation of efforts to unseat him. Such speculation was confirmed by Senator Imee Marcos, who stated that there were plans to oust Zubiri from the Senate presidency, attributing such efforts to pressure that "came from outside the Senate". On May 20, 2024, Zubiri resigned the Senate presidency after 15 senators expressed their support to oust him from the post. Senator Francis Escudero was nominated as his successor and was elected without objection.
  
  While in government after UniTeam's large victories in the election, Duterte remarked that the UniTeam had already "served its purpose" but claimed that the alliance was still "intact". Following mounting tensions between the Marcos and Duterte political clans, Duterte resigned from her roles as Secretary of Education and co-vice chairperson of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict. Political observers saw Duterte's resignation from her positions in the Marcos administration as a confirmation of the collapse of the UniTeam. Some labeled Duterte as a potential " leader of the opposition ", a label that she would reject, claiming that she was "still friends" with Marcos.
  
  Political scientist Julio C. Teehankee observed that a broad united coalition is unlikely to form in 2025 given that the Liberal Party, the traditional political opposition since 2016, has more in common with the ruling Marcos administration and noted that "there is little value in debating" which political faction is the true opposition, noting the varied motivations for opposing an incumbent government.