KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 29 — DAP lawmaker Lim Kit Siang flayed Datuk Seri Salleh Said Keruak today for the latter’s alleged poor research and ignorance on the country’s online condition, accusing Salleh of busy playing up propaganda for the Prime Minister.

According to Lim, the Communications and Multimedia Minister should instead be replaced by somebody who has the expertise and passion to restore Malaysia’s previous vision to be an information technology superpower.

“Can Salleh outline what initiatives he had discussed or introduced in his two months as the new Communications and Multimedia Minister to improve on the internet infrastructures to ensure that Malaysians enjoy fast, affordable and  extensive access to Internet?” said the DAP parliamentary leader in a statement.

“I suspect such a notion never entered Salleh’s mind in the past two months, as he was only pre-occupied to be the chief propagandist of the Prime Minister — although even in this field, he is also quite a let-down.”

Salleh had accused Lim of not being aware of the wide range of Internet speeds that Malaysians can choose from when he grumbles about the slow Internet speed in the country.

The minister also said that even though higher broadband speeds are available, the majority of customers would subscribe to the cheaper ones and thus slower packages.

“This is not the point, as the issue is that high Internet speeds in Malaysia are too costly and unaffordable when compared to other countries when the Minister’s task is to make them affordable and popular,” Lim retorted.

He then listed down the average broadband speeds in the region, pointing out that Malaysia’s speed of 5.5 Mbps was way below the regional average of 12.4 Mbps.

Lim added that Malaysia has even been beaten by the likes of Cambodia, Vietnam and Thailand when it comes to Internet speed, with the region topped by Singapore at 61.0 Mbps.

In 2014, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak was reported saying that Malaysia’s broadband penetration rate then stood at 67.1 per cent.