Main UK Political leaders grappling with the hung Parliament impasse following the recent elections.
The caretaker UK Premier Gordon Brown has thrown British politics in a further spin by offering to resign as Labour Party leader in a calculated move to show up the waning fortunes of the party beaten into second place by the Conservatives.
The UK elections on 6 May returned a hung Parliament that has caught the unsuspecting UK electorate unawares and generated intense political lobbying among the three main political parties Conservatives, Labour and Liberal Democrats.
If Zimbabweans were miffed by the events following the harmonised elections in March 2008 they were saved from showing their ire by repressive laws that did not and still do not allow them to openly express their frustrations without suffering recriminations from an intolerant government.
Not so in the UK where freedom of expression is guaranteed and encouraged.
The electorate is annoyed and confused as to what has gone wrong with their politics.
Most were annoyed that the ruling Labour Party had failed to deliver some of its promises over the past 13 years it has been in power and many were alienated from the party by the manner the party handled its leadership transfer from charismatic Tony Blair to the more serious and robust Gordon Brown who comes across as a no nonsense leader.
They voted against the ruling party in their multitudes but not in enough numbers to ensure any other party gained an absolute parliamentary majority crucial to allow a party to nominate the all important Prime Minister who has the powers to form and lead the post election government.
Not surprisingly the UK electorate is bemused by the political paralysis that has followed their election results.
Before the elections there was national talk that due to unsavoury events surrounding MPs’ expenses claims, a coalition government could be more effective and accountable to the British than is the case with a monolithic majority party.
There appeared to be no appreciation whatsoever of the difficulties political formations with diametrically opposed ideologies and sectarian interests would be faced with in trying to form such a coalition government.
After the election results were made public the highly influential British media gave the nation false hope that a solution to the electoral impasse was likely early the following week following the Liberal Democrats/Conservative overtures at joining hands in the coalition government.
The appearance of upbeat spin doctors for both parties on TV and in print media as well as on radio, twitter and face book exuding confidence at the pace and constructive manner the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats talks were proceeding heightened expectations of a quick resolution among the electorate.
But as time passed and the fruits of the fruitful discussions between the two parties were not served to the nation anxieties, exasperation and outright anger started to creep in and replace the hope.
Liberal Democrats who increased their national popularity support by 1% but in real terms reduced their parliamentary seats by 6 have emerged as the holders of the casting vote that will determine which of the two parties Conservatives or Labour would acquire the undisputed right to form the post election government.
Conservatives are not amused that they have to bend backwards on their policies and values to a party they have little if not any ideological synergy.
But even more compelling are fears among the Conservative party leadership that if they do not swallow their pride and court the support of the Liberal democrats, chances are their political nemesis Labour may just pounce and forge an alliance with the liberal Democrats that will render the electoral gains of the Conservatives count for nothing.
Liberal democrats are not amused that their party is being courted by the Conservatives to prop up ideologies that are not in sync with their values. They are equally disturbed that denying listening to the Conservatives who led the electoral race by a distance is immoral.
Even more compelling is the fear about the long term effects to the Liberal Democrats’ political future if they decide so soon after an election in which their national support had taken a significant rise back to the fold of the loathed Conservatives instead of Labour whose ideologies closely approximate those of the liberal democrats.
The decision is not easy for the Liberal Democrats because their leaders are at best not the best of friends and at the worst of incompatible leadership styles that are beyond reconciliation.
Not surprisingly the Liberal Democrats are receiving brickbats from their own grassroots membership and sympathisers, Conservatives party and labour grassroots supporters all hoping to influence the party to be guided by either principle or morality in its decisions to choose who to join between Labour and the Conservatives.
The Conservatives have been quick to point out the immoral guilt the Liberal Democrats will live with if they decide to join with Labour in denying them their hard fought electoral success.
The Conservatives have adopted “the formation of a strong and stable coalition government” as its main lure for the Liberal Democrats to consider joining them ahead of joining Labour.
The thinking is instructed from the belief that mathematically a Conservatives and Liberal Democrats will raise a 363 Parliamentary majority giving the alliance a comfortable 37 seat leeway in passing reform legislation.
Should the Liberal Democrats however choose to form the coalition with Labour they will not only lose their political moral creditworthiness but they will carry the risk of propping an electorally discredited party to assume power through the back door and still not be assured of an absolute Parliamentary majority through the union.
This is premised on the mathematical permutation that a Labour and Liberal Democrats coalition will only raise 315 Parliamentary seats 11 short of the 326 threshold necessary to push through reform legislation and they will need to scrounge for support elsewhere which will not be guaranteed.
First the British grassroots must never be fooled that any of their three main political formations have national interest as their central political goal because the very reasons they are separate entities are sectarian more than homogeneous national interests.
Secondly the argument that is commonly being advanced that a Labour/Liberal Democrats coalition will be immoral, weak and ineffective has no validity as the same can be said of the Conservative/Liberal Democrats because within the increased numbers there will also be increased ideological differences.
Not only that, the outrageous, mischievous and unfounded argument that the Labour/Liberal Democrats coalition will retain a second unelected Prime Minister being peddled by the influential British press are misleading the unsuspecting British public.
The British electorate has no direct role in electing the country’s Premier who is a product of Party nomination and appointment by the Queen. For that reason alone the argument must fail.
There is nothing in the British Constitution that precludes the Labour/Conservatives, Labour/Liberal Democrats, Conservatives/ Liberal Democrats in the circumstances such as those obtaining after the recent elections.
If government strength and national stability were the central consideration then why have the Conservatives not been forthcoming in making overtures to Labour to form a coalition?
Surely such a coalition would have more numerical seats than any other that can be cobbled under the current circumstances yet no one seems interested in such a strong union.
There are fundamental political drivers that are pushing both Labour and the Conservatives to seek alliances with the Liberal Democrats and not each other and one such force is ideological differences and the desire for power retention.
These compelling forces are more sectarian than national and the sooner the British electorate wakes up to that reality the more they will understand that they will not further their national interests by abrogating their responsibility to choose their leaders to party political leaders.
To show how such naivety on the part of the electorate is dangerous and must be dissuaded it only took the announcement by Prime Minister that the Liberal Democrats had chosen to explore coalition formation with the Conservatives for the nation to realise how immoral it was that their votes against Conservatism could actually end up counting in favour of that which they voted against.
In like manner when the Premier announced the desire by the Liberal Democrats to open formal coalition talks with Labour it dawned on many other nationals how immoral it would be for a party many believe had lost the election to be retained in power through the decision of another party that came a distant third in the election sidelining the party that secured not just the highest number of seats but the highest popularity vote y of all the contestants.
But because politics is not just premised on morality the electorate must realise that according to their voting preferences all the issues that they are now laming on Party leadership like attempting to cling to power by Labour, emulation of Zimbabwe’s Mugabe politics by Labour, abandonment of the crucial economic recovery initiatives in preference of resolving political power agendas by the elected politicians, that they are now voicing concern over were scripted by none other than the electorate.
All the politicians are doing is having fun with the power games presented to them by the electorate and any outcome is possible from their negotiations.
No political formation will be able to decisively deal with the economic worries of
the nation unless it secures guarantees that its solutions will get legislative support.
That is why it is imperative for the leadership to secure its power base first before attempting to resolve the economic and social needs of the nation.
Any party leader who fails to realise that is like an army general who commands his forces into battle before opening the armoury and adequately equipping his forces.
The obvious loss of the battle by his powerless and ill equipped army will be imminent.
That is why the intricate coalition negotiations are protracted. All party leaders want to guarantee their political futures first and then guarantee the future of the nation thereafter.
By announcing his intention to quit labour leadership at its next Congress Gordon Brown has just done his party and political future a great service and it’s telling from the reaction of the Conservatives who hitherto were not amenable to consider electoral reforms to adjust their position accordingly.
The change of terminology from coalition to mean a union between two parties to form a government and Rainbow coalition to define an alliance of several parties in forming a government does not in any way make a difference.
A coalition is a temporary union between two or more groups especially political parties and that is what voters will get if they elect hung Parliaments.
The political formations with the best deal making expertise will emerge as the winners even in cases where they trailed in electoral popularity and morality takes second place to deal making prowess under the circumstances where political formations that are formed with the sole objective of exerting influence on power are asked to negotiate their way into power.
British voters unused to this reality must chill and wait for the outcome of the political process they have abrogated to their political leadership as for now the matter is out of their control having failed to make the best out of the elections opportunity they were presented on 6 May 2010.
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