/var/www/private/config.ini

    [Events]
    servername=localhost
    username=root
    password=root
    dbname=database

function db_connect() {

    static $connection;
    if (!isset($connection)) {
        $config = parse_ini_file("/var/www/private/config.ini",true);
        //$config = parse_ini_file("../private/config.ini",true);
        print_r($config);
        $connection = mysqli_connect($config['servername'], $config['username'], $config['password'], $config['dbname']);
    }

    if ($connection == false) {
        echo 'error';
        return mysqli_connect_error();
    } else {
        return $connection;
    }
}

// Connect to the database
$connection = db_connect();