President Muhammadu Buhari on Saturday raised the hopes of parents of over 200 schoolgirls abducted over 500 days ago by Boko Haram insurgents at Government Secondary School, Chibok in southern part of Borno.

Governor Kashim Shettima conveyed this message to 90 male and female parents of the missing girls at the Government House in Maiduguri on Saturday.

The 90 represented about 200 parents at the interactive session with Shettima. The remaining parents were in support of the meeting but were asked to wait back in Chibok to avoid conveying too many of them to Maiduguri.

Governor Shettima, it was gathered, did not go to Chibok so that his convoy doesn’t interrupt ongoing security activities being carried out by the military along the routes to Chibok.

The 90 parents were quietly conveyed with high considerations of their safety with an understanding that all over 200 parents were to be affected by outcome of the meeting with the President’s representative.

Shettima, on behalf of Buhari, said he was very hopeful that the schoolgirls were alive and that efforts were on top gear to have them rescued safely to reintegrate with their families.

“These priceless schoolgirls are our daughters and they are dear to us as much as they are to you. We share the agony and sorrows you are experiencing as well as our abducted girls, as Government we are working hard to rescue our girls alive and healthy.

“I am optimistic that the girls are still alive and will soon be rescued and handed over to you parents by the grace of God. As leaders we are responsible for the welfare of our people and are accountable before the Almighty God, as such while the rescue efforts go on relentlessly, the government will continue to render assistance to you as their biological parents.

“We are aware that most of you the parent cannot attend to your sources of livelihood, go to work, go to farms nor carry on with your trading because of the psychological trauma and agony you are going through and this is to be expected.

“It is for this reason, we find it an obligation to support you in trauma management and in offering some economic support and these support are not compensation for your daughters because we have not lost hope in recovering them, indeed no sane parent gives up on the recovery of a missing child”, the President said.

Buhari noted that as a father who knows the love of a girl child, he knows exactly what it means to have a daughter missing and as such he feels the agony and the psychological trauma the parents go through, hence his genuine and concerted commitment to rescuing the schoolgirls.

He, however, called on the parents to continue to exercise patient no matter the difficulty they faced.

He commended them for their demonstration of strength since the abduction on April 14, 2014 by insurgents.

The President explained that the abduction on other murderous activities of the Boko Haram insurgents was a calamity that has befallen the country and it has no religious or tribal connotation, as the terrorists are killing both Muslims and Christians and persons of all tribes so long their victims don’t share their vicious ideology.

Buhari also assured the parents that the insurgency which led to the abduction will come to an end soon as possible, as government is fully committed to fight the insurgents to a stand till especially with renewed global and regional military cooperation as well as the commitment so far displayed by newly appointed service chiefs and their gallant armed forces who have shown so much patriotism and great sacrifice in defense of their father land.

One of the parents, Lawan Shettima who spoke on behalf on the parents thanked the president for his concern about their plight and assured the president of their cooperation.

He said the parents had so much fate in the Buhari administration.