Party season begins...

Ramadan is over and the warm up to Christmas is here, and with it comes the party season.
After a month where Nigeria and Lagos is relatively quiet due to fasting, the party season has started with a vengeance.
Nigerians love to hold a party and for the highbrow section of society there is always the task of better thy neighbour.
The brash competitiveness of Nigerians comes out in force.
The finest halls are hired and often millions of Naira (around 250 naira - £1) is spent on venue, decorations, food, ushers, drink, entertainers of the moment and party favours. This season is filled with birthdays, weddings and any other excuse. It is big business in itself.

One such bash was a party for a leading Oil and Gas company director this weekend. The guest list read like a who's who of Nigeria's oil producing elite and the champagne was flowing.
What was more than interesting was that a larger proportion of the guests were connected to some well known individuals here in Nigeria who are under investigation for various fraudulent business practices. But they seemed more than comfortable with the champagne in hand.

It gave me an uncomfortable feeling to know that this was occurring in a country where the UN statistics point to around four fifths the population existing on less than 2 dollars a day. The hotel where this happened charges 3 times my drivers monthly salary for a room per night.
My wife made an interesting comment drawing parallels between 18th century France and Nigeria today, where the elite numbers in the few thousand and controls 99% of the wealth how can fairness and justice for the many occur while the few enjoy their champagnes and canapes... Until there is a drastic change here there will be a vast gulf between the have and have nots...