BAKTI Investigates Burning Incident Of East Palapa Ring Tower In Papua

East Palapa Ring Tower in Puncak, Papua (doc. Kominfo)

JAKARTA - Telecommunication infrastructure included in the East Palapa Ring network in Puncak Regency, Papua, was damaged after being burned by an unknown person. As a result, two microwave towers were damaged.

The Ministry of Communication and Informatics (Kominfo) immediately stepped in and made efforts to repair the damaged telecommunications infrastructure. Given the damage to infrastructure can disrupt the telecommunications network in the area.

"Kominfo is currently working on several things, namely a thorough investigation to find out the identity and motives of the perpetrators," said Director of the Telecommunication and Information Accessibility Agency (BAKTI), Anang Latif, in his statement, Monday, January 11.

This incident caused telecommunications services in Ilaga City to be cut off and the network in several surrounding cities was disrupted. According to Anang, his party will immediately make efforts to backup connectivity in the affected areas using other technologies, such as satellite (VSAT).

Kominfo will also strengthen cooperation with security forces and local governments to prevent similar incidents from recurring. "This incident will certainly be a valuable lesson for all of us that if infrastructure is not maintained it will have a detrimental impact on society."

It should be noted, Palapa Ring telecommunication infrastructure development has been started since 2015 and completed in 2019. This project seeks to provide equitable and equitable telecommunication access throughout Indonesia to the 3T (frontier, outermost, and disadvantaged) areas.

The infrastructure, often referred to as the "sky highway", consists of fiber optic cables with a length of more than 12,000 kilometers. This project is divided into three regions, namely, West Palapa Ring, Middle Palapa Ring and East Palapa Ring.