Broadband target exceeded

(The Star) – Broadband penetration in the country has already surpassed the 50% target set for the end of this year.

Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin said this was a result of the commendable cooperation between the public and private sectors as well as leadership.

Muhyiddin said statistics up to the middle of this month showed that the initiatives and programmes launched under the National Broad-band Initiative, which included expansion through the use of technologies on various platforms, had increased broadband penetration to 53.5%.

He said the increase was a vast improvement from the 22% penetration recorded in 2008, which meant that the country was well on its way towards achieving the target of 75% broadband penetration nationwide by 2015.

“We have created more community broadband centres, including Kampung Wifi, as part of efforts to increase the penetration in rural areas and in the fringes of towns,” he said after chairing the meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Broadband here yesterday.

He added that six Kampung Wifi pilot projects had been implemented and 3,100 would be created by 2014.

He said the Broadband Action Brigade formed by the Government would also continue its work to tackle issues related to broadband services.

On the Universal Service Provision programme under the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC), Muhyiddin said RM800mil a year was used to buy laptop computers for needy students nationwide.

The funds, he said, were also used for projects to build more multimedia and communications infrastructure as part of the efforts to make broadband services available to more Malaysians.

He was commenting on calls by certain quarters for the MCMC to ensure that the use of the funds was transparent since it involved a huge sum of money.