How many public holidays from now until Christmas? Here’s how to make the most of it

While the meat is still settling and you battle to get the braai smoke out of your hair, your thoughts may now turn to when the next public holiday is.

Well, the bad news is that we are now in the longest stretch of the year between public holidays: 83 days.

We will have to wait nearly three months to celebrate the Day of Reconciliation on 16 December.

But when it does come around it will be a long weekend.

How to make the most of it

The public holiday is on a Monday, midway through the Dezemba season of holidays and parties.

Assuming your colleagues haven’t already got their leave in, you should take at least Friday the 13th off. That will give you a four-day weekend.

If you have even more leave, you use six leave days and get 13 days off by taking 17 to 24 December off.

And if you have two more, you can take the rest of December off.

This would mean taking off from 17 to 24 December, 27, 30 and 31 December.

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Why do we celebrate the Day of Reconciliation?

According to government, 16 December “is a day of great significance in South Africa because of two historical events that took place on that date”.

The first of these was the Battle of Blood River fought between the Zulu nation and the Afrikaaner pilgrames, the Voortrekkers. Known during the apartheid period in South Africa as the “Day of the Vow”, it was remembered as the day the Voortrekkers took a vow with God that they would build a church and observe it as a day of thanksgiving if they won.

The day also marks the 63rd anniversary of the formation of the Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK) military wing of the African National Congress (ANC). While ANC leaders were exiled during apartheid the day was celebrated by freedom fighters every year after MK’s founding.

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Coming together

“With the advent of democracy in South Africa, 16 December retained its status as a public holiday.

“South Africa’s first non-racial and democratic government was tasked with promoting reconciliation and national unity.

“One way in which it aimed to do this symbolically was to acknowledge the significance of the 16 December in both the Afrikaner and liberation struggle traditions and to rename this day as the Day of Reconciliation,” government said of the holiday.

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