Do you want free Astro?
Seen as a way for Putrajaya to push its views to the urban poor, 50,000 households will be getting free satellite TV decoders and dishes under the eKasih programme.
"To tighten the digital gap, we need to prepare such facility for free or at a minimal fee so that the low-income group can get access to information.
"This free satellite TV launched today can also be called a 1 Malaysia product for the people," Datuk Seri Najib Razak said at the launch today at the Cochrane Perkasa flats here.
Astro's new free service, called NJOI, has taken 19 months to take off from a promise by Najib to Sibu voters in May 2010.
The prime minister vowed during the Sibu by-election campaign that some 200,000 people in Sarawak and Sabah would enjoy free-to-air television via satellite from August 2010 but the intervening months have mutated the concept into a 1 Malaysia service starting with the urban poor.
Najib launched the service in mainly opposition-held Kuala Lumpur, where several 1 Malaysia thrift shops sell moderately-priced items for the urban poor unable to cope with rising consumer prices -MI