UPDATED: Jonathan ‘didn’t plan to visit Chibok’

Presidential spokesman Reuben Abati has denied that President Goodluck Jonathan cancelled his trip to Chibok, Borno State.

Abati, through his twitter handle @abati1990, said: “Every trip by the President is usually pre-announced. The Presidency did not at any time announce a trip to Chibok today. Ignore rumours. The statement issued by my office yesterday (Thursday) indicated very clearly that the President is scheduled to travel to Paris today (Friday). It is therefore wrong and malicious to allege that a non-existent trip has been cancelled.”

Reuters had reported on Thursday that the president would visit the town where hundreds of schoolgirls were kidnapped on April 14/15.

The news agency’s story was published by various news outlets, including TheCable.

However, a presidency source has denied the report – although Reuters stands by its story, further reporting on Friday that the president decided to cancel the trip for security reasons.

“Presidential spokesman Reuben Abati has issued a statement that the president will be travelling to France today (Friday). That is the fact. The president is not going to Chibok. Simple as that,” a presidency source had said.

The president has been widely criticised for not visiting the scene of the abduction saga which is generating global attention following a social media campaign, #BringBackOurGirls.

“If the president is going to Chibok, it will not be advertised in the media,” the source explained.

“He would have left by the time you hear.”

The official said it would be “foolhardy” to expect the president to tell the world he was on his way to Chibok.

“That will just give Boko Haram a great opportunity to organise an embarrassment of international proportions for the president, just to prove a point. You don’t hear President Obama is going to see American troops in Afghanistan or Iraq until he has arrived and departed,” the source explained.

No country will put the president in harm’s way, the official said.

Jonathan is expected to fly to France on Friday for a regional summit on security, with Nigeria’s northern neighbours Chad, Cameroon and Niger in attendance.

It is an initiative of the French government to tackle the Boko Haram insurgency which has been difficult to fight partly because of the countries’ porous borders.

The three other countries are francophone and the influence of France on its former colonies is expected to help secure co-operate with Nigeria over the security situation.