Could this be another "Article 23" moment?

Marchers petition Beijing

Momentum seems to be building for a march on HK government headquarters on Sunday 29 July 2012, to protest against plans to introduce "Moral and National Education" as a stand-alone curriculum subject that will become compulsory in primary and secondary schools within three years. Middle school students have formed Scholarism (學民思潮) to oppose the plan; and are mobilising fellow students. Similarly, a 'babies against the bomb'-type National Education Parents' Concern Group has been formed, and concerned mothers will also attend with their children. The march, which is to start at Victoria Park at 3 pm that day, is being organised by 14 bodies including the Professional Teachers Union and Federation of Student Unions. Organisers expect 2–3 thousand, maybe up to 10,000 marchers.

Education Secretary Eddie Ng Hak-kim initially expressed his disapproval of the China Model booklet and later backtracked somewhat. Ng has been ridiculed by opponents to this plan, inherited from the Tsang administration, for his media presence of late. In a faux pas that was widely criticised, Ng went on an unpublicised trip to Beijing, leading to suspicions that he had been summoned to meet with officials to secretly have his ear bent over National Education. Also, Ng has not appeared in public for a week; he opted instead to publish three articles in five days on the Education Bureau's website. His articles said that the government proposed in May that schools would have three years to launch the subject so they can prepare their own materials. He continued to downplay the controversy, saying contemporary China part accounted for only 5 percent of the syllabus.

「中国模式」–
the controversial 'Chinese Model' booklet

As a strong indication that the central government is solidy behind this agenda, China Daily published this article about children born in 1997. Furthermore, an op-ed said "The opposition to national education has been focused on its format, content, values and teachers since the start, but these issues can be resolved through rational discussion. Hong Kong is an inalienable part of China and local students need and are obligated to learn more about the country". They argue that the subject is commonly taught around the world and many examples exist of how this has been successful.

True that the proposal enjoyed a four-month consultation in May 2011, but consultations are typically not widely publicised. As has happened in the past, people feel they have been misled when unflagged issues arise in the application/execution. What the government might not have bargained for was the not inconsiderable public backlash following release in early July of the "problematic" 'China Model' booklet produced with HK$72 million of public money. Baptist University's teachers' union criticised the booklet, which was co-produced by the university's Advanced Institute for Contemporary China Studies, saying that the incident harmed the reputation of the university. Among others, the Liberal Party, which was instrumental in the government abandoning enactment of Article 23 provisions, has called for further delay to rethink the proposals in light of public disquiet. Local churches had already announced they would not introduce the subject in their schools pending further evaluation of its incidence on religious and moral education.

As a corollary, when researching the topic I could not find any "final" proposals; the draft published for consultation seemed to be the only version available despite different web links. Could it be that the proposals were so perfect that the consultations yielded no suggestions judged worthy of incorporation and no area of improvement?

Further reading:
"Moral, Civic and National Education" Education Bureau website
Kahon Chan (25 July 2012), "Born in 1997: Post-handover national identity" China Daily
Winnie Chong (27 July 2012) "Class struggle"The Standard
Cyril Pereira (25 July 2012), "Hong Kong schools get mainland propaganda" Asia Sentinel
中國模式 "Chinese Model" aka "Beijing Consensus" (source in Chinese)