Who doesn’t like a good holiday? As a matter of fact, I believe that we don’t even have enough holidays to begin with. Right now, the only holidays that we really enjoy in my country are religious holidays. That’s the Muslim holidays and the Christian holidays, they make up for the majority of the holidays. Then, when you factor in dates like Independence Day and Democracy Day, I think those are the only national holidays that we have. So, we definitely need more holidays.
I won’t even mind that entire weeks are allowed to be free, even for holidays. Okay, that might be taking it too far. But if I’m being honest, there should be at least one public holiday every month, no matter what at all. There should be a day when everyone, both students and workers, just stay at home and have a good time.
But then, will there be a repercussion for such a drastic act? One day off every month? I don’t think it will have any major effect on the economy. Already, many workers clear out their desks in anticipation of the holidays. They do this to make sure that nothing will interfere with enjoying their holiday, and even better, when they return to work, they don’t get a backlog.
So, I believe that it can indeed be possible. Even for essential services. And those who choose to work on those days will be compensated generously. And to buttress my point, many countries around the world are already experimenting with the idea of a 4-day work week. Asking for this even means more days off than my original ask. And so far, the experiments have been successful, and it’s been confirmed that working for four weeks did not affect the economy in any way.
I believe that when you know what you’re working with and you know the set time you have to work on, then you’ll be able to figure out how to make it happen. Four days is enough to do the job that used to take five days, especially when there is enough motivation to get it done. And with this analogy, I’m certain that the twelve extra public holidays (one day for every month of the year) will be a walk in the park.
If anything, this would even boost the economy, because there will be more reasons to celebrate and have a good time. Parents will take their families out, the roads will be freer and cleaner, and everyone will be able to get their much-needed rest. And even those who actually choose to work do it knowing that they’ll get paid for overtime as well. So, everyone wins in all this.
Because right now, no one is winning. In Nigeria, we have at least a couple of months back-to-back where there are no holidays at all, and then we have some where there are so many holidays. None of those will be touched. We’ll just add twelve more to them. I don’t even care what the holidays will be based. It could be named after historic figures, or buildings, or even because of an event.
I don’t really care. I just want to know that on that day, I’d be snug in my house without having to worry about work. Nothing more, nothing less. But it’s all good! I look forward to more holidays for all.
Thank you for reading. Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments below, I would love to know what you’re thinking. Till we meet in the next post.
This post is inspired by the second topic of this week which is Holiday Season. Feel free to try it out.
N.B: All images used in this post are mine. The thumbnail was designed using Canva.
