Civic center in a mall

Malls have been called today’s “town plazas,” the centers of social and civic life where people gather for fresh air, socialization and entertainment, and carry out their daily business.

But while in the past, entire families would gather in town plazas usually after Mass in a nearby church and watch a basketball game or listen to bands, these days, families trek to malls to enjoy the air-conditioned coolness, shop for any sort of merchandise, eat in restaurants or fast-food centers, take in a movie, and even attend Sunday Mass.

Malls now dominate our social lives. They are now places where we get together with relatives and friends, and conveniently combine our daily activities beneath one roof.

It is also, increasingly, a place where citizens can interact with government agencies. Where before one had to go from office to office, with government offices seldom located in a single location, now those dealing with the state can carry out their business in one convenient location, in the cozy premises of a mall.

A pioneer of this civic-center-in-a-mall concept is Robinsons Land Corp., which offers dedicated areas in its Robinsons Malls across the country to house satellite offices of various government agencies, especially those most frequently patronized by citizens needing documents like driver’s licenses, passports, membership IDs, or services and information.

Recently, Roseann Coscolluela Villegas of Robinsons Land took this columnist on a tour of Robinsons’ “Lingkod Pinoy Center” in the place where it all started, at the Robinsons mall behind the Edsa Shrine which was one of the pioneers of the “supermall” concept in Metro Manila.

Robinsons Ortigas is by itself historic. The Edsa Shrine stands on the bit of land where that memorable encounter in 1986 between tanks and armed Marines, and citizens armed with nothing more threatening than rosaries and flowers, took place. Robinsons was built just behind the Shrine, the first such complex in the area, and together with the Shrine constitutes a melding of spirituality and commerce commemorating one of the most memorable and prideful moments in current history.

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Maybe that’s what motivated members of the Gokongwei family behind Robinsons Land to be the first to offer a dedicated space, the Lingkod Pinoy Centers, in their malls to service ordinary Filipinos who would otherwise have to conduct their business over several days, enduring the inconvenience and crowding in government offices.

It is, in a most meaningful way, a form of public service, bridging the needs of the mass of Filipinos and the services offered by government, while providing a comfortable environment for all. “Of course, we have the food court and other outlets to serve them if they should get thirsty or hungry,” says Roseann with a smile.

On the day she brought us around on our “tour,” we came too late in the day to catch the long lines of people who gather at the premises hours before the mall opens seeking to transact with the personnel of the various satellite offices.

The longest lines, we were told, are those of folks seeking clearances from the National Bureau of Investigation or applying for passports, and those dealing with the Social Security System, Government Service Insurance System, and other such bodies. And because this Robinsons mall is located just across Edsa from the main office of the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration, a large number of those patronizing the Lingkod Pinoy Center are overseas workers or those seeking to work abroad.

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At the Lingkod Pinoy Center we visited, the largest office is that of the Department of Foreign Affairs, dedicated solely to facilitate applying for and getting one’s hands on a passport, the current backlog notwithstanding.

Also catering to a large number of patrons are the offices of the Land Transportation Office, for applicants for driver’s licenses; the NBI for the aforementioned clearance (why this is still a requirement for any sort of employment or deployment is a mystery to me); the SSS and GSIS, PhilHealth and Pag-ibig for members’ needs; as well as the Bureau of Immigration for the documentary needs of foreigners.

PhilPost also has a counter in the Lingkod Pinoy Center, where we found a short queue of folks sending parcels and letters. Less in demand perhaps were counters or offices of other partner agencies: the Department of Trade and Industry for entrepreneurs’ needs; the Securities and Exchange Commission, for those needing business licenses; and the Tourism Infrastructure and Enterprise Zone authority for OFWs seeking travel tax payment exemptions or refunds, plus the Land Registration Authority for land and property documents.

Roseann estimates that five million citizens and/or visitors have been serviced by the Lingkod Pinoy Centers in the Robinsons Mandaluyong mall and its 27 malls nationwide.

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Malls can also play an important role in next year’s elections because it has been proposed that voting be allowed in them, provided the voter’s home precinct falls within the mall’s geographical area. Recently, Robinsons also hosted the Commission on Elections for voters registering their biometrics, although the service has been curtailed for now.

Of course, other malls under different corporations also offer similar services, so the number of people who now interact with government agencies in these novel locales should number way above five million by now.

Roseann clarifies that the government offices in the Lingkod Pinoy Centers don’t pay rent, although the arrangement is covered by memorandums of agreement. It’s certainly a significant form of public service, cementing the status of shopping malls as today’s centers of civic and community life.