POWER SHARED AND DECENTRALISED

Today, the differences in multicultural Switzerland — whose four official languages are German, French, Italian and Rumantsch — are carefully respected. The members of the country’s government, the seven-strong Federal Council, have to be representative.

“Everybody should be represented, the sexes, the religions, the languages, the city and the countryside,” Ms Barbara Iseli, an official of the Canton of Bern, told reporters recently. “And the parties as well,” she added, almost as an afterthought.

When a council member retires, it may not be easy to find a Catholic, female, German-speaking replacement, someone joked.

The current Swiss President, Madam Doris Leuthard, who is visiting Singapore today, will only hold this post for a year, before another council member takes over the annually-rotated job.

Power is not only shared but decentralised — the 26 cantons and 2,600 or so municipalities are largely autonomous.

Apart from its unique history, there are certain factors that enable the participatory Swiss system to work, where it might lead to chaos and deadlock in many other countries. These include a high literacy rate, the country’s small size and “fairly sophisticated media services. The people have to be well informed in order to be able to make rational decisions”, said Ms Andrea Blaser, another Canton of Bern official.

Dr Ooi Kee Beng, a Senior Fellow at Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, said:

“This type of democracy has a tradition attached, where there is a pro-activeness in social life; and a political maturity which also makes it possible to discuss most things without hostility; as well as a broad education system that concentrates both on hard and soft subjects.

“Rightly or wrongly, newer nations do not suppose themselves to be able to afford such conditions.”

But there is one trade-off for the Swiss: Change can be slow in coming under direct democracy, Ms Blaser acknowledged. “It’s a long process to change, to have a new law for example.”

For instance — and ironically, for its allcomer’s approach to decision making — Switzerland was the last country in Europe apart from Liechtenstein to give women the vote, in 1971.

Still, while building consensus to reach a decision may take time, it also makes for stability, said Ms Barbara Iseli: “It may be slow but it’s really a decision of the majority that will last.”

Tabitha Wang

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Yes, if you are in Hong Kong, which treats trees as evil Godzilla-like beings on a constant lookout for people to squash.

A couple of weeks ago, an 80-yearold banyan tree collapsed in Central.

Only two people were mildly hurt by the falling branches, but from the uproar it raised, you would have thought the 10-metre tree had targeted those two in some kind of kamikaze mission.

Granted, sometimes falling trees can cause tragedy. On June 14, one fell in front of a cyclist, who swerved to avoid it, hit his head on the pavement and later died.

And then there was the one everyone remembers: The death of university student Kitty Chong Chung-yin, 19, when a diseased tree fell on her in 2008.

But what some people don’t understand is that trees are living things and, like all living things, will die if they don’t get enough nourishment and care. When a tree falls, it’s not the fault of the tree, but that of the authorities looking after it.

The problem is, the authorities here treat trees like pests, rather than natural beauties.

People ask me what I miss most about Singapore. I tell them that, apart from the food and the people, it’s the trees.

I yearn for the lovely shade they cast on a sunny afternoon. I dream of my favourite stretch of road — the bit along the East Coast Parkway where rainforest trees spread their branches over the whole six lanes.

What rubbish, you say? After all, doesn’t Hong Kong have plenty of trees and hectares more national parks than Singapore?

The Leisure and Cultural Department says it plants 10,000 trees, 500,000 annuals and close to 3 million shrubs every year.

To be fair, the place, which once used to be described as a “barren rock”, has been good with its reforestation attempts and is green where it used to be grey.

But take a closer look and you’ll notice that most of the lush greenery is confined to mountainsides and parks.

All you see in the city itself are spindly shrubs in plastic pots amid acres of concrete and asphalt.

The pots are for convenience as the roads and pavements are always being dug up, so they can hardly have permanent greenery.

No one seems to know what to do with the lovely banyans Hong Kong used to be known for.

Unlike in Singapore, which will divert a road just to save a tree, the authorities here allow heritage trees to be encased in concrete and, when the trees start dying because their roots can’t get enough water and nutrients, order them to be chopped down.

They treat trees more like cancerous growths than living things which can help with Hong Kong’s pollution. When it comes to greening urban areas, Hong Kong falls far behind our Garden City.

They’ve just finished one part of the waterfront where I often wait for the shuttle bus home. Finished, that is, to the town planners, but I found it uncomfortably empty.

For weeks, I kept wondering what was missing, when a Singaporean friend happened to remark: “That place needs some greenery.” Ah yes, trees to break up those soulless cement plazas and squares between the buildings.

The concrete jungle effect is most felt now, when temperatures start rising.

In the winter, shade isn’t crucial, but in the summer, it can mean the difference between arriving for a work meeting looking cool as a cucumber or like amelting tub of ice-cream.

There is a vast expanse of concrete

in front of the Star Ferry pier in Tsim Sha Tsui that I refuse to cross in hot weather.

With no shade in sight, you can feel your hair frizzle before you get to the end of the whimsically-named “piazza”.

I once asked a Hongkonger why the city seemed to have a death warrant out for trees and, after denying it weakly, she paused and said: “Maybe it’s because we can’t control them. They grow where they want and fall when they want. Oh, and they always become toilets for dogs.”f a tree falls in a city but no one gets killed, does it still make headlines?

Tabitha Wang thinks dogs do more for Hong Kong’s trees than humans do.

in Braddell. TODAY FILE PHOTO

Unlike Singapore, which will divert a road just to save a tree, the authorities in Hong Kong allow heritage trees to be encased in concrete and, when they start dying because their roots can’t get enough water, order them to be chopped down.