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Manila. Ramgen Bautista was a budding young actor. He was also the love child - one of nine - fathered by a famous film star turned politician with a mistress half his age.

Late last month, a hitman allegedly hired by a younger sister and brother murdered Ramgen.

He was only 23, and his killing has gripped a nation hooked on telenovela soaps about family feuds with plots that seem less fictional by comparison.

Police believe the motive was a quarrel over the monthly allowance shared among nine children fathered by former senator Ramon Revilla Sr, 84.

The bloody slaying has been front-page news since it happened on Oct 28.

But the interest in the case has not been fueled solely by the tragedy suffered by a family prominent in both politics and show business. It has also highlighted a problematic fixture of Philippine society: The 'second families' of married men.

Revilla has fathered 72 children with 16 women, including seven with his wife, said the spokesman for one of his sons, Senator Ramon Revilla Jr, who is also an actor. The brood's youngest is a daughter aged 15.

Although frail these days, the impressively moustachioed "Don Ramon" - as he is often addressed - retains his matinee-idol good looks into old age.

"There is a Latin American flair to our society. We are like a Spanish colony with American values," said Julie Yap Daza, who has written a book on etiquette for mistresses, and is working on a sequel.

With abortion illegal and many Filipino men averse to using condoms, second families and illegitimate children are "accepted" by society, she said.

What is more, divorce is not an option in the staunchly Catholic Philippines.

The nine children Revilla fathered with his lover Genelyn Magsaysay, now 42, took his real surname, Bautista (Revilla was the stage name he used in about 60 films). The children and their mother lived in a large home on a housing estate in Manila.

People close to the family say the siblings quarreled over a S$9,000 monthly allowance paid by their father, and were barely on speaking terms with each other. With their mother reportedly in financial difficulties, Ramgen, the eldest, managed the household's budget.

The prime suspects in his murder are his brother Ramon Joseph, 18, who is in custody, and sister Ramona, 22. The police believe they had masterminded the killing.

The masked hitman stole into Ramgen's room about an hour before midnight, stabbing him 10 times with a knife and shooting him in the chest with a .45 calibre pistol.

The actor's 22-year-old girlfriend survived being shot in the head, but needed facial reconstruction surgery. The hitman fled the house.

Although she was a suspect, Ramona was able to leave the Philippines on Nov 4, taking a flight to Istanbul - her husband is Turkish - via Hong Kong. According to media reports, detectives in the Philippines were told by Interpol in Turkey that she left Istanbul for an unknown destination just several hours after arriving there. Senator Revilla, her half-brother, called her absence a "sign of guilt."

Prosecutors have given her until Nov 18 to return to give a sworn statement and face more questioning.

Sociologist Randy David thinks the case says much about Filipino children growing up in households without the steadying influence of both parents

'This is not so different from the situation that many families of overseas Filipino workers confront today,' he wrote in the Philippine Daily Inquirer.

Rather fittingly, the senior Revilla's legacy as a lawmaker was to author legislation mandating that children born out of wedlock have the right to use their father's name. The measure became part of the country's Family Code in 2004.

"The child should not suffer the stigma of illegitimacy," said Revilla at the time.

He did not marry Magsaysay after his wife died in 1998. The Revilla children apparently did not approve of his mistress becoming the family matriarch.

As for Ramgen, his life was snuffed out before he could make his mark as an actor. He had parts in two television soap operas and a few movies.

But in choosing Ram Revilla as his stage name, he had clearly hoped to carry the torch for a third generation of Revilla screen heroes.

Reprinted courtesy of Straits Times Indonesia. To subscribe to Straits Times Indonesia and/or the Jakarta Globe call 021 2553 5055.