Nigeria Holidays List 2026

Note: Nigeria works a Monday to Friday week with a Saturday to Sunday weekend. Unlike some countries, the calendar is not fully fixed in advance: the secular and Christian dates are set in the Public Holidays Act, but the Muslim holidays (Eid el-Fitr, Eid el-Kabir and Id el Maulud) are declared each year by the Minister of Interior on behalf of the Federal Government once the National Moon Sighting Committee confirms the crescent moon, so they can move by a day from any printed calendar. The Federal Government can also add a work-free day or declare a substitute at short notice, and state governors can declare their own holidays, which is why states such as Lagos or Ogun sometimes observe days that are not on the federal list. Employers should treat the Federal Government's official announcement as the final word before finalising leave calendars.

How Nigerian Holidays Impact Payroll and Leave Management?

What makes Nigeria different is that the calendar reacts to announcements rather than sitting fixed all year. The secular and Christian dates are locked in the Public Holidays Act, but the big Muslim holidays are declared by the Minister of Interior on behalf of the Federal Government once the moon is sighted, so they can land a day either side of what a calendar predicted, and the Federal Government can add or move a work-free day with little notice. Add to that the power of state governors to call their own holidays, and a team in Lagos or Ogun can be off on a day the rest of the country is working. All of it is paid time, and anyone who works a public holiday is owed extra under the Labour Act, so payroll has to follow official declarations instead of a plan made in January. Tracking each announcement by hand across attendance, leave and overtime is where mistakes start, which is why most teams let a system pick up every Federal Government declaration and apply it across rosters and pay automatically.