At first blush, the crusade against the Government Service Insurance System being waged by ex-Senator Ernesto ?Boy? Herrera appears noble and altruistic.

He fumes about the losses of the GSIS? multi-million-dollar foreign investment. Lately he has been ranting about GSIS? loss of a whopping P14 billion due to its sale of its 27-percent share in the power distribution giant Manila Electric Co. to San Miguel Corp.

What surprises us is that all of Herrera?s anti-GSIS tirades is not getting any media coverage at all, except perhaps for a couple of tabloids, considering the huge amount he is talking about and how controversial GSIS has been in the past few months.

Usually Herrera?s ?revelations? get big media play. But after we looked at his ?expos?s? closely, we are no longer surprised why the major dailies and the television and radio networks are paying no attention to them.

Sad to say, Herrera?s ?expos?s? are a dud. This is sad for someone who made a name in the Senate and was one of the more outstanding legislators and labor leaders at one time.

Perhaps Herrera has been blinded by his desire to get extensive national media exposure to launch a new bid for a Senate seat in the 2010 elections that he has not been able to choose his advocacies well.

Take the issue he has raised on the P14-billion profit that GSIS lost by selling its 27-percent stake in Meralco late last year.

Herrera?s argument is that if GSIS sold its shares last March 6, when Meralco stocks were at P129 per share, it could have made a P14-billion extra profit compared to the P90 per share that it got from the transaction with San Miguel.

Herrera should know that those who have even just a little knowledge of how the stock market works are very amused at his naivet?. If he just consulted with the stock market experts, they would have told him that that?s not the way the market works.

If we follow Herrera?s logic then Meralco shareholders who unloaded their stocks at P14.75 per share in the first three months of 2006 are monumental fools since they should have waited until March 6 this year when prices have gone up to P129 per share.

But stock market trading is not that simple. Market conditions and the way stock traders appreciate the situation influence their decision to buy or sell stocks. There is no crystal ball that would predict how stock prices would behave and there is no ?Law of Hindsight for Stock Purchases? as Herrera wants people to believe by his comments.

The fact is stock market analysts believe that GSIS president and general manager Winston Garcia achieved a major coup of sorts when he was able to dispose of GSIS Meralco shares at P90 per share when the prevailing price at the stock market was only P44/share.

That transaction netted GSIS P13.4 billion, if you reckon the price Garcia got for the Meralco shares compared to the prevailing price in the open market.

The P129-per-share price last March 6 that Herrera was referring to was artificial and did not last long. It is doubtful that the price of Meralco stocks would have gotten that high if GSIS did not sell its stock to San Miguel. It is also doubtful if GSIS, if it still had its shares, could have disposed of them easily and at that price.

The initial surge in share prices of Meralco to P75/share from Jan. 20 to Feb. 11 this year was fueled by news about the expected battle for control of Meralco between the Lopez group and San Miguel.

The share prices went up even further and peaked at P129/share because of the reported entry of PLDT and the Manny Pangilinan group into Meralco.

The P129/share price of Meralco shares on March 6 did not last long. Meralco shares were trading at P92/share last March 12.

Considering the dynamics and complication of business and the economy as well as the stock market, Herrera should reconsider his advocacies.

Labor is his forte and his expertise. He should concentrate on labor issues where he is the specialist and everything he says would be listened to.

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Our friend, Manila Times columnist Dan Mariano, a proud Waray-Waray, is reminding those with Babatngon, Leyte roots about the activities for the 53rd anniversary of the ?Kusog Babatngon.?

Kusog Babatngon is set to celebrate its 53rd founding anniversary on April 4 at the Santo Ni?o de Leyte shrine along Commonwealth Avenue in Diliman, Quezon City.

Made up of Metro Manila residents with roots to the town of Babatngon, the organization was founded in 1956 by the late San Juan City Councilor Genaro Aventajado, who was Kusog Babatngon?s first president.

For over five decades, Kusog Babatngon has been helping its members though social and community services.

A thanksgiving mass in honor of Babatngon?s patron San Vicente Ferrer will culminate the April 4 anniversary celebrations at 5:30 p.m. Expected to attend are members, officers, their family members and friends as well as prominent Babatngons led by Mayor Charito Montano-Tan.

For inquiries and details, call Kusog president Fortunata ?Tattie? Copuaco Vicente at (632) 382-1486.