- Festac Town
Festac Town is a housing estate located along the Lagos-Badagry Expressway in
Lagos State ,Nigeria . Its name is derived from the acronymFESTAC which stands for Second African Festival of Arts and Culture which was held there in 1977. [http://www.cbaac.com/festac_77.htm] [http://www.faceoffestac.net/index.os]History
Festac town originally and officially referred to as "Festival Town" is a large housing estate where the participants of the Second Festival of Arts and Culture held in Nigeria were accommodated. After the Festival, the Federal Government of Nigeria allocated the housing and landed properties to eventual winners who participated in a ballot. Initial regulations forbade such winners from renting and disposing-of the properties to third parties. The first was held in
Senegal , another West African country. The estate is believed to be one of the largest in Africa with low, medium and high income earners. Festac town is managed by the Federal Housing Authority.status
The status of Festac is somewhat confusing as the Federal, State and Local Government all lay claim to the management of the estate and occasionally issue the residents with various charges ranging from valuation fees, Local Government levies to tenement rates. Despite this, the estate remains in terrible neglect with all the facilities in utmost deplorable condition. Bad roads and lack of power supply are two of the worst situations the estate is suffering from. The is also no source of potable water supply to the community.
Many of the youths of Festac town are believed to be engaging in "419"
advance fee fraud , a development blamed on lack of recreational facilities such as play-grounds for the teeming youths of the estate as the Federal Housing Authority has sold off every available open space [" [http://www.wired.com/techbiz/media/news/2005/08/68459 Nigerian Net Grifters Doing Fine] , "Wired"] [" [http://web.archive.org/web/20051029165224/http://news.yahoo.com/s/latimests/20051020/ts_latimes/iwilleatyourdollars 'I Will Eat Your Dollars'] ," "Los Angeles Times "] [" [http://web.archive.org/web/20050807235249/http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050806/ap_on_hi_te/internet_scammers Internet Scammers Keep Working in Nigeria] ," "Associated Press " via "Yahoo! News"]References
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