THE National Assembly Standing Committee on Information Technology and Telecommunication on Thursday expressed serious concern over the poor quality of mobile and internet services and decided to summon telecom companies (telcos) to seek direct answers over persistent network problems. The committee was also informed by an official of the Engineering Development Board (EDB) that efforts were underway to seek tech giant Apple’s entry into Pakistan’s manufacturing market.
The demand for both cellular and internet services has grown significantly over years, which is a healthy sign for socio-economic uplift of the society but unfortunately the service providers are not investing proportionately to upgrade or expand their systems and networks. Therefore, the phenomenon of call drops, non-availability of signals and poor quality of the internet is understandable. This state of affairs is pathetic as cellular companies are in the process of providing 5G services to their subscribers whereas the basic voice services and 4G are not satisfactory. It is the responsibility of the Ministry and Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) to take remedial measures but they have confined themselves to carrying out surveys about quality of service without any worthwhile follow up to ensure improvement in the situation. This issue was also highlighted by the parliamentary committee whose members pointed out that the root causes of poor mobile service were not being addressed and criticized the PTA for repeatedly giving the same response without improving the situation. The decision to summon representatives of the telecom companies in the next meeting might help and hopefully members of the committee will come fully prepared to take them to task. The possibility of Apple entering the phone manufacturing market of Pakistan also augurs well for the entire industry and availability of affordable quality phones to people.
