Nigeria meeting called off after parliamentary blockadepublished at 14:07 British Summer Time 7 August 2018
Ishaq Khalid
BBC Africa, Abuja
A meeting of officials of the National Assembly in Nigeria's capital, Abuja, has been called off following the earlier security blockade at the parliamentary complex.

Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yusuf Lasun, told journalists that although the blockade had been lifted, a meeting cannot be held in the current atmosphere.

The National Assembly, made up of the House of Representatives and the Senate, is in recess, but officials had planned to meet to discuss what they describe as issues of national importance, including the budget for next February's general election.
It is unclear why security officers blockaded the entrance to the building, but it comes at a time when the governing party has been hit by a spate of defections to the opposition, resulting in it losing its majority in the Senate, the upper chamber, ahead of next year's elections.