"It's like telling king Juan Carlos to mediate between Tejero and Suárez". That was the comment by the leader of Ciudadanos, Albert Rivera, which has caused a great stir on social media. Rivera was responding to the discussion between the mayor of Barcelona, Ada Colau, and king Felipe VI before the Mobile World Congress inaugural dinner.
Rivera was referring to the attempted coup d'état on 23rd February 1981, less than four years after the first democratic election following Franco's death. Adolfo Suárez was then prime minister (the Congress was actually in session that day to vote in his successor); Antonio Tejero was the Civil Guard lieutenant colonel who led the attempted coup.
The monarch told the mayor that his job was to defend the Constitution, she responded that "there are other ways to defend" it. Colau criticised the king for the speech he gave after the police repression on 1st October last year, comments which Ciudadanos's leader believes she shouldn't have made: "It's like telling king Juan Carlos to mediate between Tejero and Suárez", he said in an interview.
Social media didn't take long to spread and comment on the remark as the father of the current king is believed, in fact, to have acted as a mediator during those tense hours. Politicians like ERC's spokesperson in the Spanish Congress, Gabriel Rufián, and journalists like Toni Soler and Antón Losada have mocked Rivera's comment.
Translation: Remember that that's what his father is supposed to have done, Albert Rivera.
Which was exactly what he did. Haha.
Exactly. The king allowed general Armada to go to the Congress to propose a government with him at its head. Tejero didn't want to discuss the matter and that was that.
The real role played by Juan Carlos during the failed coup is still not completely clear, beyond his famous speech shortly after 1am on the 24th disavowing the coup. Nonetheless, it's believed that he interceded in the negotiations which led to the surrender of the coup's leaders. The king is believed to have allowed general Armada go to the Congress to negotiate Tejero's surrender.