Abdication is humiliating end to four decades on throne, despite king being viewed as having made a great contribution to Spain.
At Zarzuela Palace on the outskirts of Madrid, Spanish royal advisers were earlier this year trying to put a brave face on King Juan Carlos’s constant bungling and falling poll ratings.
They had two plans. The first was to follow the example of the British monarch after her famous annus horribilis by toughing it out and hoping that Juan Carlos could eventually recover the same degree of popularity enjoyed by Queen Elizabeth in her jubilee year.
If that failed, a plan B would be put into place following what palace officials called the Dutch model. The king would abdicate and his son, Prince Felipe, would be raised to the throne. He, at least, was still relatively popular.
Juan Carlos has now come to the conclusion that he can no longer save the monarchy from its plummeting popularity. It is a humiliating end to four decades on the throne and comes despite the king generally being viewed as having made a great contribution to his country.
Juan Carlos was placed on the throne by the dictator General Francisco Franco, and inherited a dictator’s powers. But he gave those up and helped steer Spain into a remarkable and relatively peaceful period of transition that allowed the country to join the democratic world.
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