Inter-agency Salva Me task force has placed under its custody at least 15 juvenile cult members in a move to save them from alleged sexual abuses by the cult master and to free them from an oppressive living condition.
The 15 juveniles, with ages ranging from one to 16, were rescued from a cave in barangay Buhisan, which they consider their home for the past years, by representatives of the Commission on Human Rights, the Department of Social Welfare Development, the Cebu City Commission for the Welfare and Protection of Children, among others, from the hands of cult master Alfredo Verano.
The task forc has found out that the children lacked nutrition and personal hygiene while living with the Salva Me group in the mountains of sitio Nazareth, Buhisan.
Salve Me Pater Omnis Oculus Meus, which loosely means Father forgive me for my sins, carries with it vestiges of a cult because it is small in size and the members are held together by the intense loyalty of the followers to its leader.
Cult parents, while they did not put up any resistance, watched as their children were taken away by members of the Salve Me Task Force. The children are now under the custody of DSWD.
Although Salva Me leader Alfredo Verano insisted the group’s children and women are properly taken care of, he later gave in to the team on the condition that the children be accompanied by their parents.
Initially, only 12 toddlers, children and teenagers were allowed to go. Verano asked that the infants remain in their wooden house.
During an investigation spearheaded by the Commission on Human Rights early this month, former members of the cult narrated sordid, bizarre tales of sexual abuse of women and how children were exploited and subjected to hard labor. The task force found the children living in caves and tree houses.
Asked if there is any legal action that may be taken against cult, Councilor Gerardo Carillo said the city will file a case for protective custody with the regional trial court.
Carillo, who is chairman of the committees on social services and laws and good government, said the children will not be released until such time the cultural norms of the cult change. Salve Me children are reportedly not allowed to go to school and are made to dig in caves.
The children who found themselves in a real shelter for the first time in their lives yesterday were seen to have behaved differently and tended to be shy. They spoke in a dialect that they learned only in the mountains and in their own environs.
Salva Me Pater Omnis Oculus Meus was founded in 1994 by Alfredo Verano in barangay Quiot, Pardo.
He started a following by professing healing powers and began founding his own community in the mountain barangay of Buhisan. The cult community lives in a five-story wooden house that looks like a giant cage.