WE all remember George Yeo as a statesman, a sterling Foreign Minister for Singapore, a prolific speaker and writer who would constantly
surprise and enlighten us with his ideas that span a great variety of topics, both worldly and esoteric. It is therefore most appropriate that some of his
best speeches and writings over the years have now been captured in this book titled “George Yeo on Bonsai, Banyan and Tao”.
“I think the unusual title of the book says it all. It is certainly difficult to classify George Yeo,” Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng remarked in his speech
during the George Yeo book launch function on Dec 4. Among those present were Penang Institute executive director Zairil Khir Johari,
investPenang general manager, Loo Lee Lian and exco for Local Government, Traffic Management and Flood Mitigation, Chow Kon Yeow.
In the book, the bonsai and the banyan are metaphors Yeo uses for Singapore. According to him, Singapore is a city-state which must never have an
inflated view of itself. The bonsai describes Singapore modestly, but he also adds that the bonsai can be intensely interesting and valuable.
The banyan provides shade and Singaporeans are grateful for it, but too much of it will make her weak. As for Tao, that perhaps is what gives unity
to his many interests. Lim added that in Yeo’s book, he describes Singapore as a “little speed boat” needing to nimbly navigate the potentially
treacherous waters between “supertankers” such as the US and China. “His best-known speech, reflected in the title of the book, is from 1991,
when he was the Minister for Information and the Arts. He spoke of the need for the Singapore banyan tree to be pruned – in other words, for the
state to take a step back and allow civil society to grow. “I am sure that this is an important notion that we can relate to here in Penang and
Malaysia. In Malaysia we may have freedom of speech but only in Penang do we have freedom after speech,” Lim said. He also commented that
unlike Singapore, Penang faces many hurdles in terms of transportation and infrastructure development. With very limited funds available
and just as limited authority due to over-centralisation of power in the hands of the federal government, Penang has been at its mercy in terms
of large-scale infrastructure and public transport development. “However, we have decided that we will no longer be held to ransom.
We have since launched the RM27 billion Penang Transport Master Plan project to develop a 5-in-1 transport solution involving buses, taxis, LRT/
monorail, water taxies/ferries and cable car.
“Having appointed the Project Delivery Partner in August last year through an open competitive tender, we hope to see the roll-out of this
project by 2017,” he added.