ACCLAIMED AMERICAN STATISTICIAN PREDICTS HUNG PARLIAMENT

American statistician and writer, Nate Silver has predicted a hung parliament for this year’s elections, stating that no party will will hold  the required majority of 325 seats necessary to win   next month’s UK elections, after the votes are cast. The highly acclaimed analyst went as far as assigning figures to the respective parties in a bold step of predictions likely to be inaccurate unless he has some mystical powers. 

Stanley, who appeared on BBC’s Panaroma, puts the Conservatives at the top of the list with 283 votes, Labour with 270, SNP with 48, Lib Dems with 24, DUP with 8, UKIP with 1, and says other parties will together share 16 votes. If the American statistician hits the mark accurately, we will have to crown him with a sort of genius status in the field of election  predictions.

The political analyst rose to fame when he correctly predicted the winner of 49 and out 50 States in the American elections of 2008, with Indiana being the only one he got wrong by 1%point when Obama won seats there. He also correctly predicted all 35 US Senate States that year. Silver,  also a commentator for the American ABC television channel, has a remarkable pedigree across the Ocean and will have his clout raised even further if his forecasts turns out to be is accurate as he has predicted. It must be said that it isn’t too difficult to predict with a high degree of probability the outcome he foretells given how close the polls are at the moment. However, if he gets the number of seats of most or all of the party’s with accuracy, it will be startling.  In the event he is correct, it would mean that whoever wins will have to form a minority government with one of the other minority parties.

The ideal outcome for British politics, is for  an outright winner to emerge otherwise it shows that none of the politicians is good enough to dominate the polls, and effectively lead the country.  An elected Prime Minister should be exactly that- elected in a convincing way. It will be a big blow for Cameroon if he has to revisit old ground because this will show him to be lacking a crucial factor necessary for true leadership. That factor is called ‘outstanding qualities’. We all know Cameroon is highly intelligent and with the best quality of education anyone can hope for. However, real leadership requires more, and for that reason Cameroon has to hope that he can cause a dramatic change in the next 10 days.