FINANCE Minister Peter Phillips said yesterday that it would take much more than the involvement of the country’s political parties to lift Jamaica out of its current state.

“Ultimately the search for an effective nation is going to have to engage the whole nation, not just political party organisation, but mobilising people in all facets,” he said.

“The nation’s business is too important to be left significantly in the hands of politics and will require courageous engagement, courageous, impartial, honest and sincere engagement of persons of good will and patriotism,” Phillips said.

The finance minister, who was addressing the Kiwanis Third Divisional Council Meeting at MICO University College in Kingston, noted that the country’s many challenges at this time included a high murder rate, corruption, high public debt and slow economic growth.

However, he pointed out that politics should be partly blamed for the situation that the country is in.

“How did it get to this? At least part of the answer, I believe, has to do with the nature of our political processes and the absence, up until recent, of effective paradigm oversight and absence of transparency,” he said.

In addition, Philips said the manner in which policies were discussed as well as the management of the country’s finances had also thwarted the country’s capacity to develop national consensus around difficult choices that have to be made.

But he said that despite the problems, some progress had been made, especially as it related to transforming the country’s political culture.

He listed the establishment of the Office of the Ombudsman, the Office of the Contractor General, the Electoral Commission and the passing of the Corruption Prevention Act as steps that had been taken in that regard.

Yet, Phillips said: “We ought not to assume that we have satisfied all of the requirements of the transformation of our political culture,” he said. “Once the standards are clearly set and there is an active engagement and defence of those by persons independent of political organisation, then we will see, I believe, a more responsive political thrust.”