KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 25 ― Communications and Multimedia Minister Datuk Saifuddin Abdullah today explained that the postponement of the Media City project will affect Radio Televisyen Malaysia (RTM) as most of the equipment and systems used are under the scope of the project.

He said part of the Media City project which was implemented Build, Lease, Maintain & Transfer (BLMT) concept under the Private Finance Initiative (PFI) has been completed and used by RTM.

The RM125 million allocation for the Angkasapuri Complex is to pay the rent or availability charges of the Media City project.

"The scope of this project is to equip the existing RTM building with new broadcasting infrastructure and upgrade the existing broadcasting equipment from Standard Definition (SD) format to High Definition (HD) format,” he said when winding up the debate on the Supply Bill 2021 in the Dewan Rakyat.

According to Saifuddin, the Media City project is also in line with the National Digitisation Project, which is the migration from analogue broadcast system to a full digital implementation nationwide.

On the Malaysia Emergency Response Services (MERS) 999 service, he said the system would continue and would be migrated to the new Next Generation Emergency Services (NG999) System.

The new NG999 system will take into account the development of new technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), Big Data Analytics (BDA), Internet of Things (IoT) and 5G, to produce a more robust, efficient and effective system thus improving the service. ― Bernama