Malacañang asked for the public's understanding as the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) continued to work on creating a master list for the government's vaccination drive against the coronavirus disease (COVID-19).
Presidential Spokesman Harry Roque made the statement amid reports of individuals getting COVID-19 booster shots from different local government units (LGUs).
In his press briefing on Monday, Roque addressed suggestions that so-called "LGU-hopping" could be avoided if the government had a master list.
"Meron po tayong ginagawang master list, 'yan po ay proyekto ng DICT (We are already making a master list. That is a project of the DICT)," he said.
"Kaya lang po, gaya nang hindi naman natin inaasahan talaga iyong pandemyang ito (However, because we did not expect this pandemic), we've had to make that master list as we go along," he added.
The Palace official added that DICT's master list will also answer calls for a uniform certificate of vaccination.
"Diyan po papasok yung DICT list natin. Ngayon po, nandiyan na ang programa, pinapasok lang po ngayon galing sa mga LGUs yung mga nabakunahan na (That is where the DICT list comes in. The program is now here, the LGUs are just uploading the data on the people who got vaccinated)," Roque said.
"Kaunting pasensiya lang ho (We ask for your patience)," he added.
In an interview with One News last week, Cabinet Secretary Karlo Nograles said the LGU's uploading of data took the back seat because they were probably overwhelmed with the many tasks they had to accomplish.
He likewise suggested that the lack of regional presence of the DICT could have contributed to the delays-- the same reason why they had to tap the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) to remind LGUs to upload the necessary data.