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Burkina Faso’s transitional legislative assembly has passed a new law cutting the number of paid public holidays, a reform the government says will save the state about 16.88 billion CFA francs and improve the efficiency of public services.
All 70 voting members of the assembly unanimously adopted the bill during a plenary session on Thursday, January 9, 2026. The new law overhauls the country’s system of paid days off and commemorative dates, repealing legislation adopted in November 2015.
According to the executive, the number of paid days off decreases from 15 to 11, resulting in budget savings of 16.88 billion FCFA.
The reform also abolishes the rule that automatically granted a paid day off when a public holiday fell on a Sunday.
The law also significantly reclassifies certain emblematic dates in the national calendar.
Several key dates have been removed from the list of paid holidays and reclassified as days of commemoration and reflection.
These include All Saints’ Day, National Martyrs’ Day, and the anniversaries of the popular uprising and independence, plus August 4, 1983, marking the beginning of the Revolution, and October 15, 1987, the date of the assassination of former president Thomas Sankara.
However, the government claims that May 15, a day devoted to customs and traditions, is a paid holiday to affirm the secular character of the state.
Minister of Labour Mathias Traoré said the reform introduces a new approach to the national calendar.
“From the adoption of this law, it will be a question of paid days off and days of commemoration and reflection, and no longer of holidays which are instituted by law,” Traoré said
The government said the changes form part of a broader effort to assert national sovereignty and improve administrative efficiency.
These measures will ensure continuity of public services and improve the performance of the public administration by reducing the number of days off and paid leave and increasing working time,” the minister added, noting that decisions on days off would now be announced according to the requirements of the circumstances.
