"What is of interest now is to locate the girls. The girls are not in Chibok," said the Nigerian leader, whose last-minute cancellation of a visit to the town, ostensibly for security reasons, was widely criticised.
"I will visit Chibok," he said, but did not give a date.
Jonathan also dismissed criticism that the Nigerian response had been slow, saying the terror "only started in 2009 and we didn't have the architecture to deal with that."