The Minister of Health and Social Services, Dr. Esperance Luvindao, clarified that the government’s plan to implement a biometric system within the ministry is not related to irresponsible fund allocation but is aimed at improving accountability with time management.

Responding to Nudo MP Vetaruhe Kandorozu’s question about the ministry investing in a biometric system despite medicine shortages, Dr. Luvindao explained that the shortages are not due to lack of funds but rather lead times in medication delivery.

Regarding the biometric system, she said it was introduced in response to community complaints about doctors’ attendance:
“Even now, your doctors are not arriving on time. They leave when they want to. We come. We sit for hours. We wait. We are at the state facilities while specialists have been given limited private practice. They leave state facilities. They go to their private facilities while patients are waiting in line. Those are the concerns that we've received.”

She added:
“And because we do not want to be reactive, but we want to respond according to the complaints and the needs of community members, we then sought to try to say, 'Let's pilot a biometric system,' which then means, and this is nothing new, it is happening all across where you clock in when you come into work, you clock out when you are leaving work, so that we as a ministry can better track and be better accountable to the community.”