As the Spanish government struggles to contain the national deficit and pay off debts, the 74-year-old king, once celebrated for his role in toppling the Franco regime, had to apologize to Spaniards last month for an expensive elephant hunt he indulged in in Botswana.
Before that, he said that he does not sleep because of the youth unemployment problem, which has risen to as much as 50 percent, and that in the time of austerity, politicians must set a personal example.
Admittedly, the trip was paid for by a friend, but that trip was the final straw for the recession of the exhausted Spaniards who had already gotten over the story that the king's son-in-law Inaki Urdangarin abused his position and embezzled money through a sports humanitarian organization.
At the beginning of the month, the court got into another trouble. The king's 13-year-old grandson Felipe Juan Froilan, son of Princess Elena, although a minor played with firearms and wounded himself in the leg.
All these incidents caused unprecedented criticism of the royal family in a country where the press traditionally treats the Bourbon dynasty gently and avoids British-style reporting on the private lives of members of the dynasty, so, for example, only foreign media knew how to write about the king's alleged mistresses.
The left-wing Unida party, which also brings together communists, again demanded that Spain become a republic, and the leader of the Madrid Socialists, Tomás Gomez, said that Juan Carlos would have to think about whether the time had come to hand over the crown to his son Felipe.
"The demand that any Spanish king abdicate has never been made before," said Charles Pauvel, professor of history at Madrid's CEU-San Pablo University.
"The demand for responsibility has never been made at this level before," he added.
"We want what exists in a constitutional monarchy. The king would have to answer to the people and, if necessary, the constitution must be changed," said Alfred Bosch, a parliamentary representative of the small left-wing "Esquerre Republicane" party.
The king's adventure in Botswana became public only when Juan Carlos injured his hip while hunting and ended up in the hospital. Opposition groups in the Spanish parliament demanded that the government answer them with how much money it took part in that adventure (eg expenses for the king's security). The government was given one month to respond.
Juan Carlos' popularity late last year fell below 50 percent for the first time since he took the throne, but the woes besetting the royal family are unlikely to spark more calls for a republic because both of the biggest parties, the People's Party and the Socialists, favor a monarchy.
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