A number of governments have experimented with 4-day weeks and work-from home plans. Mainly these have been in the US and Europe, but the Nigerian state of Kaduna has announced plans to let public sector workers shift to a (kind of) 4-day week:

The Kaduna State Government has announced the commencement of a transition to a four-day workweek for public servants in the state.

The development, according to it, will permit public servants to work from home for one day per week….

The Statement said, the measure is designed to help boost productivity, improve work-life balance and enable workers to have more time for their families, for rest and for agriculture.

Also, it noted that it will help reflect lessons learnt from managing the Covid-19 pandemic which required significant relaxations of old working traditions and the ascendance of virtual and remote working arrangements.

Interestingly, the government has gotten some pushback from the Christian Association of Nigeria, “ alleging a hidden agenda in the policy:”

Rev. John Joseph-Hayab, lamented that citizens of the state had been subjected to pains by the governor’s “unpopular policies”…. He said: “Workers must be sure that the policy is not aimed at reducing their salaries.

“They must be convinced that the government will not wake up one day with another shocking news of salary reduction since the five day working days have been reduced to four.”

So far it doesn’t look like this is aimed at either reducing salaries or reducing total working hours, but it’ll be interesting to see how it plays out.