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Source: China Daily (Hong Kong Edition)
Leung Tak-wah, the Vice-chairman of Hong Kong's Taoist Association has announced that, next week, he will petition the HKSAR government to declare Laozi's birthday a statutory public holiday in Hong Kong.
Laozi is the philosopher whose writings formed the basis for the Taoist faith, and whose birthday falls on the 15th day of the second lunar month (ie. today, then 19-mar-2011, 7-mar-2012, ...).
The push to add more traditional public holidays in China began soon after the handover of the territory to the People's Republic of China in 1997 (06-May-1997), and resulted in the addition of the Ching Ming public holiday (30-Mar-1998) and the later addition of Buddha's Birthday as a public holiday (09-Sep-1998).
Since then, there have been attempts to have a public holiday declared for Confucius' Birthday (23-Oct-2006, 23-Apr-2007 and 09-Jan-2010), but nothing has come of it yet.
Related links:
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Hong Kong 2012 bank holidays and public holidays (current year)
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Hong Kong 2013 bank holidays and public holidays (next year)
• Hong Kong bank holidays and public holidays (news and updates)
• Worldwide
bank holidays and public holidays news updates (March 2010)
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Hong Kong Taoist Public Holiday Update