Wan Ahmad Fayhsal Wan Ahmad Kamal (PN-Machang) said the push by the communications ministry “blatantly” contravened Section 133 of the Communications and Multimedia Act.

He said the section prohibited licensees from engaging in any conduct which had the purpose of substantially lessening competition in a communications market.

“But who will reprimand the communications ministry before the second rollout?” he said when debating amendments to the Audit Act.

Wan Fayhsal said a preventive mechanism was needed to avoid another 1MDB-like fiasco, which he described as a “governance nightmare”.

He said that currently, the practice was to rope in the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) to investigate any irregularities.

“But the PAC only comes in after it (an irregularity) has taken place.

“We want to prevent a ‘nasi sudah menjadi bubur’ situation,” he said, quoting a Malay idiom equivalent to crying over spilt milk.

Last week, Wan Fayhsal called on Putrajaya to halt plans to develop a second 5G network, saying the current scheme might lead to a conflict of interest among mobile network operators (MNO) and Digital Nasional Bhd (DNB).

Wan Fayhsal’s call for the plans to be suspended follows the announcement by communications minister Fahmi Fadzil that he had instructed the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission to identify and appoint an MNO to develop the second network.

However, Wan Fayhsal said Putrajaya had previously made it a requirement for telecommunications companies to have a stake in DNB, the owner of the country’s first 5G network.