Communications and multimedia minister Annuar Musa told the Dewan Rakyat that his ministry found that phone line service in certain areas was not as good as promoted by telcos to users, adding that this was unfair to consumers.

He added that the ministry would monitor the financial performance of Malaysian telcos to ensure that their profits could be channelled back into boosting services in rural areas.

“We will conduct random checks. There are some places where we conducted tests, where the internet speeds were not just below 25 megabits per second (Mbps), but even below 10 Mbps and 5 Mbps.

“This is an unfair situation for users and we want to remind these companies to continue working with the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) to offer the best service they can,” he said.

He was answering Ahmad Johnie Zawawi (GPS-Igan) who wanted to know if Putrajaya planned to upgrade existing communication towers in view of weak internet coverage in many areas.

Annuar also said the work order for the construction of the National Digital Network (Jendela) telecommunication towers in Sabah and Sarawak will be issued by this month.

“Our goal is that by the end of the year, 3G network coverage will be shut down and the country can fully transition to 4G coverage,” he said.