THE POLITICS OF A HUNG PARLIAMENT AND WHY DAVID CAMERON REMAINS IN LIMBO

On Thursday, UK voters turned out in their millions to elect candidates for Westminster as well as those who should be in charge of the country's thousands of local councils. If all had been well, the UK would now have had one David Cameron MP leader of the Conservative party as the Prime Minister replacing Labour's Gordon Brown.

More than seventy two hours after the votes had been tallied and results announced, voters are still been denied a Prime Minister as the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats try to work out a deal that would see David Cameron heading a minority government of sorts - a government that would find it hard to get things done - creating the atmosphere for fresh elections under a year.

On record the results went this way -
Conservative  - 307 led by David Cameron
Labour           - 258 led by Gordon Brown
Lib Democrat - 57 led by Nick Clegg

Theoretically, David Cameron can become Prime Minister leading a minority government that would have a very short life span and so he has been wooing the Liberal Democrats to become a partner of sorts in a coalition government that would give the Conservative government a bit of a breather.

They have been talking for more than three days now and up to this morning of Monday the 10th May, they still have not come to any type of agreement and that should not come as a surprise because the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats are alike as cheese and chalk with both parties seemingly having entrenched positions on issues like immigration, the Trident missile system, Europe, electoral reforms and most importantly how best to tackle the country's deficit.

And tackling the UK deficit is the key to any successful and lasting new government because in the run-up to the votes when all three leaders were engaged in the country's first pre-voting debate, all three rubbished the policies of the other. After the first debate, pundits and pollsters gave Nick Clegg the lion's share of public opinion, the second appeared to be evenly stretched between the Lib Dems and the Conservatives while in all the polls pundits put Prime Minister Gordon Brown a poor third.

At one point, the polls seemed to indicate that in a vote, the Lib Dems of Nick Clegg would kick Labour into third position as far as the number of seats to be garnered were concerned. Many news outlets gave the Labour party a drubbing saving their most stinging barb for the Prime Minister Gordon Brown whom some have now chosen to dub "squatter at No 10" even though constitutionally, the outgoing Prime Minister Gordon Brown in tendering his letter of resignation to Her Majesty the Queen has to inform Her Majesty of who she has to invite to the Palace as the new Prime Minister.

As sitting Prime Minister, Gordon Brown should have been the first to talk to Nick Clegg on forming a coalition of sorts but respected the wish of Nick Clegg who had blustered, and maybe quite rightly, that he deemed it fit to have talks with the Conservatives as that party garnered the greatest number of votes. More than three days on, they are still talking and the man who had predicted the Conservatives would have a wholesome victory across the board is still finding it difficult to form a government.

Both parties have a problem and the use of the phrase "in the national interest" does not seem to have washed with negotiators and supporters of both parties as they were both elected on what they promised the electorate in their manifestos.

There are fears that if either party sacrifices entrenched and core values, they would have to answer dearly to voters should their discussions come to nought.

There are suggestions that when it comes to choosing between the Conservatives and Labour, the Liberal Democrats would be more comfortable in the company of the Labour party than in the arms of the Conservatives whose leader was once described by Nick Clegg as "arrogant".

However Nick Clegg has stated his wish and he has to abide by what he told the UK voters that he would set camp with the Conservatives - a decision that has yet to bear fruit.

Media reports suggested that Labour leader Gordon Brown had had talks with Nick Clegg with the aim of forming a Labour-Lib Dem minority government.

Pundits say this would not work. The main problem being one Mr Gordon Brown who does not seem to fit well in the eyes of English voters (read UK voters) because he is Scot and that is the bottom line.

They insist that what needs to be one is for Gordon Brown to put off any idea of talking with Nick Clegg and allow the Conservatives and Lib Dem to come up with a government of convenience. It is predicted that such a government would not last a year with elections predicted for the autumn.

Should they come to a minority government, Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown can then tender his resignation not only as Prime Minister, but would use the opportunity to announce that he would be stepping down as Leader of the Labour party. This would start a leadership race that would inevitably see one of the Labour young Turks becoming leader thereby putting Labour on a firmer footing that should see them sweep the polls in fresh elections.

The Labour party must not be waved off now. The number of Westminster seats under its wings show that despite the negative publicity before the polls, the party still boasts of supporters who can go out there and get things done.

The racist BNP that had garnered seats in some local councils and dared to put up its leader Nick Griffin for a seat in Parliament got the Riot Act read to them by Labour as the BNP lost all those Council seats as well as giving Nick Griffin a bloody nose.

With new boundary lines in East London, the Respect party fielded candidates in two constituencies - none won.

Labour also made history when the party's two female Muslims made it all the way to the House of Commons.

All the political parties were warned that a hung Parliament could emerge after the votes were counted.

None heeded this piece of advice with the Conservatives and Lib Dems predicting that they would have many more seats.

After the votes, the Liberal Democrats did badly, losing five seats.

The Conservatives did well gaining many more seats but without a majority.