Slow internet continues to haunt users in Pakistan as the country's main telecom operators Thursday refused to give a timeline for the resolution of the problem.
Internet users across the country had been complaining of hindered access to services throughout 2024 and so far 2025 is not faring any better.
Pakistan Telecommunications Limited (PTCL) told Dawn.com that there is no exact date for the root of the slow internet connectivity or the fixing of the Asia-Africa-Europe-1 (AAE-1) undersea internet cable.
PTCL spokesperson Aamir Pasha said that to iron out the slowdown, PTCL "added additional bandwidth which has majorly resolved [the] internet slowness issue".
However, the telecom operator stated that slow internet speed might still be experienced on Meta-owned services, such as WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram, especially during peak hours.
"We expect complete resolution over the next few days," the statement added, without giving an exact timeframe. "PTA (Pakistan Telecom Authority) and PTCL are working diligently to ensure the earliest possible resolution." Meanwhile, PTCL technical personnel said that problems of this nature take between two and three months to fix. Pasha did not offer a comment on this claim.
Earlier, on January 3, PTCL said teams "are working very diligently" on resolving the disruption experienced by users amid fault in the AAE-1 subsea internet cable.
Next day, a day after PTCL, IT minister Shaza Khawaja said around 80 per cent of the bandwidth fall short caused due to the fault had been recovered as trafic has been shifted on two other cables.
However, Minister for Development Ahsan Iqbal said that the issue of slow internet was linked to the security measures, like introduction of firewall, for the safety of the country and its people.
"I am sure this issue will be resolved soon," he said in an interview with Geo TV.
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