Around 50km of highways in Peninsular Malaysia have no mobile coverage. This was revealed in a recent statement by the Works Minister, Alexander Nanti Linggi.
Among the highways that the minister listed are the North-South Expressway (PLUS Expressway), West Coast Expressway (WCE), and East Coast Expressway 2 (LPT2). The minister has since met up with Communications Minister Fahmi Fadzil, together with the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) and Malaysian Highway Authority (LLM), to address the issue.
As a result, several actions will be taken immediately in order to improve the cellular coverage on Malaysian highways. For starters, a special LLM-MCMC task force is being established to identify critical locations that are experiencing drop calls and see if there’s a need to deploy telco infrastructure in these areas.
Highway concessionaires will also be mobilised to deploy short-term and long-term solutions. Alexander noted that the MCMC and LLM’s local offices have already performed on-site inspections and identified the power supply requirements for the deployment of supplementary equipment.
MCMC to assist in Multi-Lane Free Flow (MLFF) implementation?
In the same statement, the Works Minister has also suggested that MCMC be directly involved in the upcoming implementation of the Multi-Lane Free Flow (MLFF) system. Alexander said that MCMC can assist in terms of eliminating frequency interference and providing support for the MLFF project’s technical requirements.
This is rather interesting as we haven’t heard about MLFF for quite some time. However, the minister did not provide any additional details regarding the project, although a representative from the Works Ministry has recently stated that MLFF will only be implemented in 2027 at the earliest, according to a recent report by the Public Accounts Committee (PAC).
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