Vice President of the Philippines
Vice President of the Philippines
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Vice President of the Philippines

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Vice President of the Philippines

Vice President of the Philippines (Filipino: Pangalawang Pangulo ng Pilipinas, also referred to as Bise Presidente ng Pilipinas) is the title of the second-highest official in the executive branch of the Philippine government and is first in the presidential line of succession. The vice president is directly elected by the citizens of the Philippines and is one of only two nationally elected executive officials, the other being the president.

The current office of the vice president was re-established under the 1987 Constitution, bearing similarities with the office as created in the 1935 Constitution that was abolished by the Marcos regime. The vice president may be elected to two consecutive six-year terms. The 15th and incumbent vice president Sara Duterte was inaugurated on June 19, 2022, but her term officially began 11 days later on June 30, as per the constitution.

The official title of the office in Filipino is Pangalawang Pangulo, although Bise Presidente, derived from Spanish, is the usual title used in some of the major Philippine languages, such as Cebuano and Hiligaynon language. The text of the 1987 Constitution refers to the person and office of the vice-president, with a hyphen connecting the two words. However, the person and office is usually referred to today without the hyphen, as the vice president.

The first known vice president claiming to be part of a government was Mariano Trías, whose term started on March 22, 1897. He was elected during the elections of the Tejeros Convention, and was later elected vice president of the Supreme Council that oversaw negotiations for the Pact of Biak-na-Bato in 1897. This Supreme Council had no sovereignty, did not govern any state, and was just used for bargaining with the Spanish. This council was replaced later, with no such position existing during the country's declaration of independence in 1898, which had a dictatorial government. Officially, the country's first actual republic was founded in 1899, and it too had no vice president. Trias instead served in the cabinets of Apolinario Mabini and Pedro Paterno, as finance minister and war minister, respectively. Trias is not considered a Philippine vice president as the Supreme Council did not proclaim any sovereign state.

The 1935 Constitution, largely patterned after the U.S. Constitution, provided the basis for the Commonwealth government. It also established the position of vice president, and as per Section 12, Subsection 3, the vice president may be appointed by the president to a cabinet position. But unlike their U.S. counterpart, the vice president is not the president of the Philippine senate as senators choose their president from among their ranks. The first person elected to the position of vice president under the constitution was Sergio Osmeña, elected together with Manuel L. Quezon in the first Philippine national elections.

Since the inception of the 1935 constitution, the president and vice president came from the same ticket and political party, until the 1957 elections, which saw the first-ever split ticket that won the presidency and vice presidency.

The 1973 Constitution abolished the office of the vice president and Fernando Lopez was therefore unable to finish his term. Subsequent amendments, particularly the 1984 amendments restored the vice presidency. Arturo Tolentino was officially proclaimed vice president-elect by the Regular Batasang Pambansa in 1986. He took his oath as vice president on February 16, 1986, before Chief Justice Ramon Aquino, but because of popular belief that the elections had been rigged, he never actually served out his term as vice president. Within a week after Tolentino's oath, the People Power Revolution resulted in the collapse of the Marcos regime.

The People Power Revolution installed Corazon Aquino into the presidency. On February 25, 1986, Aquino and her running mate, Salvador Laurel, were sworn in as president and vice-president, respectively. Since the promulgation of the 1987 constitution, only two elections have produced a president and a vice president from the same ticket: Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and Noli de Castro in 2004 and Bongbong Marcos and Sara Duterte in 2022.

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