Adiós King Juan Carlos

King Juan Carlos abdicates - good, bad and ugly moments in a 40-year reign

King Juan Carlos's almost 40 years on the throne have been marked by triumphs, tragedies – and some terrible trip-ups. Here is a look at some of the highs and lows in his life

THE GOOD 

 

The coup prevention

 

The high point of King Juan Carlos's reign was undoubtedly his intervention to prevent a military coup, in the shaky years after the dictator General Francisco Franco died.

 

A group of 200 Civil Guards, under Lieutenant Colonel Antonio Tejero, stormed into the lower house of parliament in February 1981, as the MPs were voting in a new prime minister. 

 

They expected the King, as head of the army, to support their moves to restore military law. 

 

Yet to their surprise, he took to national television to demand an end to the coup. 

 

"I have ordered the civil authorities and the chiefs of staff to take the necessary measures to maintain constitutional order," he said. 

 

It is still seen as his finest hour. 

 

The "Por que no te callas?" 

 

King Juan Carlos also received unexpected acclaim when he summarily dismissed Venezuala's rabble-rousing president, Hugo Chavez. 

 

The two men were at an Ibero-American summit in the Chilean capital, Santiago, in 2007 when Chavez repeatedly interrupted the Spanish prime minister, Jose Luis Zapatero. 

 

Chavez hissed from the sidelines, jeering that Mr Zapatero's predecessor was "a snake" and "a fascist" who had tried to arrange a coup in Venezuela. 

 

To the amusement of everyone, King Juan Carlos shouted out: "Why don't you just shut up?" - using the familiar "tu" form of the verb, to show his contempt for Chavez. 

 

The phrase went around the world, spawning a series of T-shirts and memes in tribute. 

 

 

THE BAD 

 

The elephant hunt 

 

Spain's El Mundo newspaper reported in January on the King's role in public life up until April 2012 was to provide "a symbol of stability," of which 76 per cent of people approved. 

 

"Then," the newspaper noted, "came Botswana." 

 

In April 2012 the royal palace reported that the King was undergoing surgery, having injured his hip on an elephant hunting safari in Botswana. Photos of the monarch posing with a dead elephant on a luxury safari – while Spain was in the midst of eurozone crisis – caused his popularity to plummet. 

 

The "close friendships" 

 

Equally damaging to the King's reputation was the revelation that he was accompanied on the trip by a beautiful German aristocrat 28 years his junior – Corinna zu Sayn-Wittgenstein, who featured on the cover of the Spanish edition of Vanity Fair magazine, described as "the mysterious friend of the King". 

 

She has maintained that "there was no hanky-panky" – but it did little to help the King's battered reputation as someone with an eye for the ladies. She said the King calls her every week – but they are just friends. 

 

A month after the hunting trip was the King and Queen's 50th wedding anniversary. Needless to say, they did not celebrate the occasion. 

 

"It would have been a bit ironic," said Jaime Peñafiel, one of Spain's most influential royal commentators. "There's nothing to celebrate." 

 

The bear hunt 

 

The red-blooded, sporting King's ill-fated elephant hunt was not his first brush with controversy. 

 

On a trip to Russia in 206, the King shot dead a bear – which was later found to have been dosed up with vodka, to slow its reactions. 

 

In a letter to the governor of Vologda, Sergey Starostin, the deputy head of the region's hunting grounds conservation department said the shooting of Mitrofan the bear was "abominable". 

 

"The party sacrificed a good-humoured and jolly bear who had been kept at a farm in the village of Novlenskoye," Mr Starostin wrote. 

 

"The bear was put into a cage and the party made him drunk with vodka mixed with honey and pushed him into the field. Quite naturally, the massive drunken animal became an easy target. His Majesty Juan Carlos killed Mitrofan with one shot." 

 

The financial scandal 

 

In February, Princess Cristina – the second oldest daughter of the Spanish monarchs – was called to testify in a corruption and money laundering case; the first time in history that a member of the royal household has done so. 

 

The princess and her husband, Inaki Urdangarin, who were given the title of Dukes of Palma by the king after she married the Olympic-medal winning handball player in 1997, are involved in an ongoing investigation into a multi-million euro fraud and money-laundering case. 

 

There is no suggestion that the King was aware of the alleged fraud. 

 

However, the case has done little to help the embattled monarchy. 

 

The Duke of Palma has been relieved of official duties, in a sign of royal anger. A series of crude emails about his in-laws, sent from his account and leaked to the press, did little to heal the rift. 

 

THE UGLY 

 

The black eye 

 

King Juan Carlos shocked onlookers by appearing in November 2011 with a badly-bruised eye and plasters on his face. 

 

The palace described it as "a minor domestic accident," explaining that one of the courtiers had accidentally slammed a door in the King's face. 

 

But it did little to reassure the Spanish public that their ageing ruler was thriving in his role. 

 

The childhood shooting 

 

Perhaps the darkest episode in King Juan Carlos's life happened when the future king was aged 18. 

 

The family were at their house in Portugal, in 1956, when his 14-year-old brother Alfonso was shot and killed. 

 

The royal family issued a statement, which said: "Whilst His Highness the Infante Alfonso was cleaning a revolver last evening with his brother, a shot was fired hitting his forehead and killing him in a few minutes. The accident took place at 20.30 hours, after the Infante's return from the Maundy Thursday religious service, during which he had received Holy Communion." 

 

Nothing more was said by the palace. However, the unofficial story remains that King Juan Carlos accidentally shot dead his brother, who nudged his elbow and caused him to fire.

 

Source. Telegraph

 

 

Vocabulary:

 

a trip-up -

 

a coup -

 

shaky (adj) -

 

to storm -

 

to support -

 

to demand -

 

to dismiss -

 

rabble-rousing -

 

to hiss -

 

from the sidelines -

 

to jeer -

 

amusement (n) -

 

to shut up -

 

to spawn -

 

to undergo surgery -

 

to injure -

 

a hip -

 

to plummet -

 

hanky-panky -

 

battered (reputation) -

 

needless to say -

 

a brush with controversy -

 

to dose up -

 

good-humoured (adj) -

 

jolly (adj) -

 

money laundering -

 

a household -

 

to be aware of stg -

 

to leak (to the press) -

 

to heal -

 

a rift -

 

an onlooker -

 

a bruise -

 

a plaster -

 

to slam (a door) -

 

to thrive -

 

childhood (n) -

 

a revolver -

 

a forehead -

 

to nudge -