Festac Town is a federal housing estate located along the Lagos-Badagry Expressway in Lagos State

Lagos State

Lagos State is an administrative division of Nigeria, located in the southwestern part of the country. The smallest in area of Nigeria's states, Lagos State is the most populous state in Nigeria and arguably the most economically important state of the country and west Africa, containing Lagos, the...

, Nigeria

Nigeria

Nigeria , officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a federal constitutional republic comprising 36 states and its Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. The country is located in West Africa and shares land borders with the Republic of Benin in the west, Chad and Cameroon in the east, and Niger in...

. Its name is derived from the acronym FESTAC which stands for Second World African Festival of Arts and Culture which was held there in 1977.

History

Festac town, originally referred to as "Festival Town" or "Festac Village", is a residential estate designed to house the participants of the Second World Festival of Black Arts and Culture of 1977. Consisting of 5,000 contemporary dwelling units and seven major avenues, the town was designed in an efficient grid in order to accommodate upwards of 45,000 visitors as well as any Nigerian employees and officers working at the Festival. The Nigerian government invested substantial sums of money and resources into building Festac Town, which sported state of the art electrical generators, police and fire stations, access to public transportation, supermarkets, banks, health centres, public restrooms, and postal services. The village was therefore intended to evoke the modern age and the promise of state-sponsored economic development fuelled by oil revenues.

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 festival was held in 1966 at Dakar

Dakar

Dakar is the capital city and largest city of Senegal. It is located on the Cap-Vert Peninsula on the Atlantic coast and is the westernmost city on the African mainland...

, Senegal

Senegal

Senegal , officially the Republic of Senegal , is a country in western Africa. It owes its name to the Sénégal River that borders it to the east and north...

.

For quite some time the majority of Nigerian computer scams have originated in the cyber cafes of Festac town. Many people who engage in "419" advance fee fraud

Advance fee fraud

An advance-fee fraud is a confidence trick in which the target is persuaded to advance sums of money in the hope of realizing a significantly larger gain...

work out of Festac Town.

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.