MONTREAL - Martin Provencher has one simple message for his 10-year-old daughter who has been missing for almost one year - "Hang on."
Even though it's been months since investigators have brought forward any new leads, the tireless father of Cedrika Provencher hasn't given up hope of finding her.
The young girl vanished on July 31, 2007, near her home in Trois-Rivieres, Que., after telling a woman she was helping a man look for a lost dog.
Her ever-determined father wants Cedrika to know that it's not just her parents, but everyone, including the police, who are still on alert.
"If there's a way to send us a signal, in whatever manner possible, she should do it," the soft-spoken Provencher said in an interview with The Canadian Press.
"I know that she's smart and if there's something, she could easily find a way to give us a clue."
Last month, the 36-year-old Provencher took part in another fruitless search with sniffer dogs after receiving some guidance from psychics.
The search party checked out a strip of highway near Cedrika's hometown, which is halfway between Montreal and Quebec City.
"It was a piece of land that wasn't done in the past," Provencher added.
He said that the search was carried out after several clairvoyants in the U.S. sent along some GPS co-ordinates.
Cedrika's 62-year-old grandfather Henri Provencher said the family believes the girl can still be found alive.
"We are sure Cedrika is somewhere with somebody and we must find her," he said.
A special mass, followed by an outdoor candlelight procession, will be held Thursday evening at the nearby Notre-Dame-du-Cap Basilica, a popular pilgrimage shrine for Catholics.
Martin Provencher says he stays motivated by the encouragement he gets from the local residents he meets in stores who tell him not to give up.
He is also kept going by the several thousand emails and calls he has received at an old bank building which serves as his search headquarters.
"We easily get about 20 emails every day," he said. "They have come from France, Africa, Mexico and Australia."
Provencher says sometimes information comes in which is passed on to Quebec provincial police.
Posters with the missing girl's picture also continue to appear along roads all the way down to Florida.
"A lot of truckers are still asking us for two-by-two foot posters they can put on their trailers," he said.
"I said from the beginning that we're working to find her and that's what we're going to do."
The slender, ever-polite man has not been working since Cedrika's disappearance and has only taken a few weeks off from the search to relax.
"I went camping and spent time in a chalet to rest up after what has been a tough year," he said in a lengthy interview.
A $100,000 reward for information to help track down the freckled-faced girl expired in May and despite thousands of tips, police say there have been no new developments since last fall.
In September 2007, provincial police released a description of a French-speaking man and a four-door red Acura car believed to be involved in the girl's disappearance.
The man in his 30s had approached several girls about needing help to look for a lost dog in the two days before Cedrika vanished.
Provincial police say the car is still an important part of the investigation.
During the past year, police also have verified several reported sightings in neighbouring New Brunswick and in the Saguenay-Lac-St-Jean region north of Quebec City.
RCMP Cpl. Marie-France Olivera, who works with the force's National Missing Children Services, says there were 60,582 reports of missing children in 2007 but 75 per cent of them involved kids running away from home.
"Most of the runaway cases usually come back within the next 24 hours," said Olivera, whose unit acts as a clearing house for information and provides support for police forces.
But 56 cases - less than .1 per cent - were reported as kidnappings or stranger abductions of children under 18.
"Kidnapping in Canada is considered (as) anyone other than the parents or legal guardian," she said.
"But that could be a grandmother, it could be a friend, it could be somebody known the family."
Alberta and Ontario each had 17 stranger abductions last year, the highest among all the provinces and territories in Canada.
But Olivera pointed out that the two provinces also have large populations.
B.C., Saskatchewan and Quebec, followed with five kidnappings each.
Olivera said the statistics indicated that, in most cases, more females than males were targeted.
"It appears females seem to be more of a target simply because, if it's a total stranger, the motivation for taking a child, especially a female child, will be for sexual gratification," she added.
Olivera said U.S. statistics reveal the females who are kidnapped are usually between 10 and 12 years of age.
Pina Arcamone, who runs Quebec's Missing Children's Network, insists Cedrika has not been forgotten and the case will remain active until she is found.
"People are still extremely, extremely troubled by the fact that this little girl has disappeared without leaving a trace," she said in an interview.
Arcamone also said Provencher was in the final stages of putting together the paperwork to set up a foundation in Cedrika's name.
She has been in touch with Cedrika's father and the family, sending them emails "a couple of times a month."
"They're very, very tired at this point, emotionally exhausted from this experience and all the dead-ends that have come up," she said.
"But they're not ready to give up."
