Planning leave around Ghanaian public holidays

By Collins Odeny. Last updated: 19 October 2026.

Act 601 is the 2001 baseline; Act 1142 is the 2025 amendment I am following

I opened the GhaLII text of the Public Holidays Act, 2001 (Act 601), the version marked as it stood from 1 June 2001 to 23 May 2002. Section 1 declares the Schedule days public holidays throughout the Republic. Section 2 lets the President, by executive instrument, declare an additional public holiday. Section 3 lets the President substitute another day when it would be inexpedient to observe a Schedule day.

The 2001 Schedule in that text is New Year’s Day (1 January), Independence Day (6 March), Good Friday, Easter Monday, Eid-al Adha, Eid-al Fitr, Worker’s Day (1 May), Republic Day (1 July), Farmers Day (the first Friday in December), Christmas Day, and Boxing Day. Constitution Day and Founders’ Day are not in that 2001 Schedule. GhaLII’s history tab on the same page records later amendments in 2002 and 2019 that the HTML I opened had not yet applied.

Parliament approved the Public Holidays and Commemorative Days (Amendment) Act, 2025 (Act 1142) on 25 June 2025. I am using the Legal Ink summary I opened and the Parliament record for Act 1142. The amendment reinstates 1 July as Republic Day, introduces Shaqq Day as the day after Eid-ul-Fitr, removes 4 August as Founders’ Day, and reinstates 21 September as Founder’s Day in honour of Kwame Nkrumah. That is the statute this site’s Ghana list now follows.

The Interior ministry, and the 2026 Friday declarations

The Ministry of the Interior published a declaration of Friday 9 January 2026 as a public holiday around Wednesday Constitution Day, and a declaration of Friday 3 July 2026 as a public holiday around Wednesday Republic Day. Those two Fridays sit on this site’s Ghana 2026 list as Constitution Day (observed) and Republic Day (observed).

The Interior statutory public holidays page is the year list I am pointing readers at for 2026. It is the live instruction for named days and for how a mid-week commemoration may be taken on a Friday. Act 1142, as Legal Ink records it, also lets a mid-week holiday shift to Friday and a weekend holiday move to the following Monday, except that the flexibility clause does not apply to religious holidays such as Christmas and Eid.

The Interior homepage remains the front door if a later executive instrument moves a Friday. I will correct the holiday list when I open that instrument. I will not keep a 4 August Founders row to hedge against a statute that already removed it.

What this site’s Ghana list now prints

After Act 1142, this site’s Ghana 2026 list includes New Year’s Day on Thursday 1 January, Constitution Day on Wednesday 7 January, Constitution Day (observed) on Friday 9 January, Independence Day on Friday 6 March, Eid al-Fitr on Friday 20 March, Shaqq Day on Saturday 21 March, Shaqq Day (observed) on Monday 23 March, Good Friday 3 April, Easter Monday 6 April, Labour Day on Friday 1 May, Eid al-Adha on Wednesday 27 May, Republic Day on Wednesday 1 July, Republic Day (observed) on Friday 3 July, Founder’s Day on Monday 21 September, Farmers Day on Friday 4 December, Christmas on Friday 25 December, Boxing Day on Saturday 26 December, and a Boxing Day substitute on Monday 28 December.

The open holiday list still prints Founders Day on 4 August and Kwame Nkrumah Memorial Day on 21 September, and it still omits Republic Day and Shaqq Day. I remove the August row, rename 21 September to Founder’s Day, add Republic Day on 1 July, add Shaqq Day the civil day after Fitr, and add Monday 23 March 2026 because Shaqq Day fell on Saturday. The studio and /feeds/gh-2026.ics now share that list.

2027 lists Monday 8 March after Saturday Independence Day and Monday 3 May after Saturday Labour Day as possible substitutes, each pending an executive instrument. Act 1142’s flexibility clause, as Legal Ink records it, lets the President move a weekend holiday to the following Monday — it does not make those Mondays automatic. I will not treat them as confirmed until Interior publishes that instrument. The same clause does not apply to religious holidays such as Christmas and Eid, so this site does not add Mondays after Sunday Eid al-Adha, Saturday Christmas, or Sunday Boxing Day in 2027. 2028 lists Monday 3 January after Saturday New Year’s Day and Monday 3 July after Saturday Republic Day the same way: pending an executive instrument, not confirmed.

Independence Day, Farmers Day, and the Fridays you do not have to buy

Independence Day is 6 March every year. In 2026 it is a Friday, so the weekend is already long. In 2027 it is a Saturday and Monday 8 March appears as a possible substitute, pending an executive instrument. In 2028 it is a Monday. The name is the 1957 independence commemoration. The leave is the weekday.

Farmers Day is the first Friday in December on the 2001 Schedule I opened. This site’s list shows Friday 4 December 2026, Friday 3 December 2027, and Friday 1 December 2028. That moving Friday is one of the few Ghana rows that is defined as a weekday rather than a calendar date. Do not pencil “4 December” into 2028.

Labour Day is Friday 1 May 2026, Saturday 1 May 2027 with Monday 3 May listed as a possible substitute pending an executive instrument, and Monday 1 May 2028. Christmas is Friday 25 December 2026, Saturday 25 December 2027, and Monday 25 December 2028. Act 1142’s flexibility clause does not apply to Christmas, so this site does not add Monday 27 December 2027 after Saturday Christmas. The Friday-heavy 2026 shape does not survive a copy-paste into 2028.

Eid dates, and Shaqq Day as a statutory public holiday

Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha on this Ghana list for 2026 are declared, not estimates. Graphic Online reports the Interior statement of 13 March 2026: Friday 20 March is Eid-Ul-Fitr, Saturday 21 March is Shaqq Day, and because Shaqq Day fell on a Saturday the President declared Monday 23 March 2026 as an additional public holiday. MyJoyOnline carries the same Interior announcement. Eid al-Adha is Wednesday 27 May 2026, declared on the Interior page.

Shaqq Day is a statutory public holiday under Act 1142: the day immediately after Eid-ul-Fitr. In 2026 that civil date is Saturday 21 March, not Monday. The declared weekday off is Monday 23 March. The 2001 Act Schedule I opened does not use the word Shaqq; the 2025 amendment does. Later years still wait for an Interior notice before I treat a Fitr weekday as locked.

The moon-sighting guide is the method. Hold a buffer before you buy a non-refundable Accra–Kumasi ticket in March. Subscribe to /feeds/gh-2026.ics so a later correction can reach a phone. A file in Downloads cannot.

Republic Day and Founder’s Day after Act 1142

Republic Day on 1 July is in the 2001 Schedule I opened and is restored as a statutory public holiday by Act 1142. In 2026 it is Wednesday 1 July, and Interior declared Friday 3 July 2026 as the observed weekday. Founder’s Day is 21 September under Act 1142, in honour of Kwame Nkrumah. In 2026 that is already a Monday. The 4 August Founders’ Day row is gone.

I will not ask a team to choose between a leftover Founders Day on 4 August and an Interior Founder’s Day on 21 September. The amendment settled that naming fight. This site’s Ghana list and the 2026 feed follow Act 1142: 21 September is Founder’s Day, and 4 August is not a public holiday.

Constitution Day on 7 January is on this site’s Ghana list and not on the 2001 Schedule. I treat it as a later statutory public holiday this list already carries — it is on the Interior 2026 list — and Friday 9 January 2026 is the Interior-declared observed weekday, not something I invented so January would look busy.

How I would sequence a Ghana leave conversation

Put the fixed Fridays on the table first: Independence Day 2026, Labour Day 2026, Farmers Day every year, Christmas 2026. Then write Founder’s Day on 21 September and Republic Day on 1 July, with Friday 3 July 2026 as the Interior-declared observed weekday. Then ask which document has the Eid and Shaqq days this year.

There is no Ghana school-term circular on this site. I will not paste Kenyan Term 3 onto an Accra household. Read your school’s own letter against the Ghana holiday list the way the school-terms guide describes for Kenya.

Print from the studio after picking Ghana. Subscribe at /feeds/gh-2026.ics, /feeds/gh-2027.ics, or /feeds/gh-2028.ics. Count a range with the working-days calculator. Ghana is in the catalogue and the feeds. It is not in the sitemap as a /ghana/2026/ hub, because that hub is not yet a written country page at this depth. Email contact@africacalendar.app if an Interior instrument disagrees with a row.

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