SYDNEY  - Australia could be in political limbo for up to two weeks after the tightest election in decades left neither of the major parties with enough seats to form a government, analysts said Saturday.

Neither Labor Prime Minister Julia Gillard or her right-leaning Liberal/National opponent Tony Abbott took enough seats to win government, leaving four independents and one Green set to become Canberra powerbrokers.

"It's conceivable we won't have a government here for another two weeks," Norman Abjorensen, a political history expert from the Australian National University, told AFP.

Gillard, who took power in a sudden party room coup against former leader Kevin Rudd only two months ago, said Saturday she will continue to lead the government in caretaker mode until a government can be formed.

But with votes in knife-edge seats still to be counted, she conceded that the government had lost its majority and that the independents would be "playing a role as the next government of Australia is formed".

Analysts said there was now likely to be furious horsetrading for influence with the independents, three of whom were previously linked to the coalition but who had been critical of both major parties.

"We're in uncharted waters here. We haven't had a situation like this in Australia for 70 years so there are no normal procedures," Abjorensen said.

"This breaks the mould of the two-party system. It's a new era in Australian politics."

Abjorensen said the result was likely to be a surprise alliance which would result in a short-term government.

"This is a recipe for a lot of instability, a lot of uncertainty," he said. "It's going to be another election down the track before the government serves its full term."

Results from Australian elections are generally known within hours of polls closing but experts expect it to be at least a week, possibly a fortnight, before the results of the 2010 polls are known.

Haydon Manning, head of politics at Flinders University in South Australia, said Australia had seen nothing like this since the 1940s.

"Take a seat and buckle in because we are going to go through a period of instability," he told AFP.

Adding to the insecurity, which is likely to affect financial markets, was the fact that neither party would be able to guarantee their campaign pledges, Manning said.

University of Western Sydney academic David Burchell said there was no question that "we are talking about a hung parliament".

"It's impossible to imagine either Labor or the coalition getting enough seats in their own right to not have to govern without the other five (independents and Greens)," Burchell said.

Burchell said it was unknown who could better negotiate with the independents, who include a former intelligence analyst who resigned in protest at over Australia's actions in the Iraq war.

But it was very likely that neither party would be able to get a reliable majority on the floor of the parliament, he said.

"If neither party can seriously claim to be able to form a majority by some kind of temporary alliance with the group of Greens and independents, they will simply have to mount a moral argument that they have the better mandate to try and form government," Burchell said, adding that this had never happened in the post-World War II period.

Burchell said that while it was unlikely, the British monarch's representative in the country Governor General Quentin Bryce also had the power within the constitution to dismiss the government and force another election.

"There's nothing in the constitution to stop her tossing a coin or deciding on the basis of how she feels tomorrow morning," he said.