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TELEKOM Malaysia (TM) Bhd staff have been reminded not to be shoddy when it comes to checking on the condition of its installations in Kunak and Manggatal, lest the lack of maintenance of these assets result in outages or other irregularities.

CelcomDigi, on the other hand, is keeping tabs on its coverage in the Ulu Kimanis area of Papar.

This follows feedback about the telecommunication service woes in Kg Simpang Empat and Kg Minansar-Toboon, as well as the hazards posed by a damaged cable in Taman Richdar. 

Hotline received the particulars about these problems from a Kunak TM subscriber, Manggatal driver and Papar CelcomDigi customer. This information was forwarded to the respective companies.

A TM spokesman said checks were made of Lorong Muhibbah in Kunak and Lorong Richdar, after it was contacted by the media.

He said the problem at the first location was traced to some faulty “distribution points (DPs)”.

“The lines in the DPs were prone to ‘shorting’ when it rained heavily, periodically giving rise to a breakdown of the Unifi services in this part of Kg Simpang Empat,” he said.

“The necessary action was taken to deal with this problem. Should it recur in future we might consider having new DPs installed.” 

He said there was no fixed schedule when it came to maintaining TM’s installations around the State.

“Our assets are attended to as and when it becomes necessary to do so.”

To this end, he said the company’s staff had been asked to be more mindful of any irregularities involving these structures and to take the appropriate action.

In the case of Taman Richdar, he said its technicians confirmed that the damaged cable belonged to TM.

“They re-secured the affected line to its housing on the spot and dealt with any of our poles which were leaning over or had fallen down.

“We suspect that the overhead line may have snagged on the top of a large vehicle and been pulled out of its housing.” 

Sabah Electricity (SE) was initially contacted about the fallen overhead line.

A SE spokesman said it had been aware of the goings-on in the housing area.

“We received a report from a Taman Richdar homeowner about the cable two days earlier,” he said.

“The individual was under the impression that it might be a live wire. He was concerned about the potential electrocution risk posed to anyone who accidentally touched the fallen line.”

Given the urgency, he said, its technicians were dispatched to the neighbourhood that same night.

“They found that the cable was not electrified. There was little that we could do as the damaged installation was not an SE asset.”

Nevertheless, the spokesman said, TM was apprised about the team’s observations.

Where Kg Minansar-Toboon was concerned, a CelcomDigi spokesperson said an inspection was made of this part of Papar, when the management learned about the customer’s inability to access 5G or 4G, according to her.

“This individual suspected that unscrupulous parties might have entered the compound where our transmission tower was located and tampered with our equipment,” she said.

“One of her neighbours had apparently told her that there was no power supply inside the compound.”

She said a CelcomDigi team was promptly deployed to assess the situation, with the network service being restored shortly thereafter. 

“Our personnel confirmed that the outage was due to a technical issue and not vandalism.

“Nevertheless, we will continue to monitor the network performance in the area to ensure consistent coverage to all our customers in the Ulu Kimanis area.”