One million MyFreeview decoders to be made available, says ministry

THE government will look into increasing the number of decoders to allow more rural folks to access MyFreeview Digital TV broadcast, said Deputy Communications and Multimedia Minister Datuk Zahidi Zainul Abidin.

“Demand for MyFreeview is very high. We will look into adding a million decoders so that we can provide free service to the people, especially in rural areas,” Zahidi said when answering a question by Dr Nik Muhammad Zawawi Salleh (PAS-Pasir Puteh).

According to Zahidi, MyFreeview currently provides 15 TV and six radio channels by RTM, Media Prima, TV AlHijrah and Bernama News Channel.

“Recently, MyFreeview added a new channel called Awesome TV, providing informative and entertainment programmes especially for youths,” he said.

Zahidi added that disruption of MyFreeview’s broadcast was at a minimal level, with Service Level Availability at 99.96% as of January this year.

However, he acknowledged that the broadcast signal for MyFreeview would be affected in areas with broadband services.

The nation switched from TV transmission to analogue full

MyFreeview Digital TV broadcast on Oct 31 last year.

On the status of development of the 5G telecommunications spectrum, Zahidi said they had yet to award the contracts to the companies.

The 5G service, touted to be 20 times faster than the current 4G mobile connection, is earmarked for development under a RM22bil National Fiberisation and Connectivity

Plan.

In June, the Communications and Multimedia Ministry said it was cancelling its instructions to the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission to allocate the 5G spectrum to five companies.

The revocation order came after controversy arose over the award process as it was said to have been done without an open tender.