Photo: Lord Snowdon

SPAIN ON DIANA Very few people in the World can be unaware of the tragic death of Princess Diana in a car crash in Paris early last Sunday morning. Although the Spanish media have, of course, given full coverage to the story every day since the accident, what is perhaps equally interesting are the opinions of the Spanish press on what one reporter called the "Cinderella Legend". Diana, although mourned by millions, including the Spanish public, was not a victim of the paparazzi "but of the public themselves who clamoured to read every detail, no matter how insignificant, of her short life". One reporter commented that he was just as guilty of her death by "just leafing through" some of the Spanish society magazines, such as "Hola" and Diez Minutos" which delight in publicising, with explicit photographs, the smallest detail in the lives of the famous - and Diana was "Queen of the cameras". The general opinion is that if the public did not "devour" this type of cheap sensationalism, there would be no need for paparazzi. "It is the public and not the paprazzi who have blood on their hands. They pay the paparazzi". Journalists are also amazed by the "collective hysteria" of the British public especially in a country with a reputation for "a stiff upper lip" in times of national tragedy. The attitude of the Royal Family was also "incomprehensible". In a reference to the Royal silence since a very brief communique from Balmoral on Sunday when the Queen said that the family was shocked by the news. Then,for "a Nation in mourning" to prompt a second Royal message, was "unthinkable".

The Windsor family's "extremely moved by public response" message only emphasized, as far as Spanish newspaper reports are concerned, the division between the Royal family and the British public. "A peculiar form of monarchy" was how one reporter expressed his sentiments adding that the predominantly Royalist British public were now at odds with the Royal family. "They, (the Royals), may have breathed a collective sigh of relief that one problem had been solved by Diana's death but she could be a bigger headache dead than alive. Fate works in strange ways". The British press were also criticised as being guilty of the tragedy. "If a poor, young, uneducated girl had been betrayed by her husband this is not news but when the husband was heir to the throne every detail is front page news. The media are guilty of manipulating history". Another reporter was "disgusted" by the excessive news coverage, both in newspapers and TV, that the tragedy received. In his opinion the brutal beheading of innocent citizens in Algiers, 300 in one day and 50 the following day was given no more than 30 to 40 seconds coverage. "Some of the murdered Algerians were women even younger than Diana but were not important enough to be mentioned".

 

Lady Di's last year's stay at the "Hotel Residencia" in Deìa All Photos: msm-archives

The media have also been accused of turning Diana into a martyr and the Princess, who never had any pretensions to sainthood "is in danger of being canonized". "The press have invented a myth and are placing Diana on a pedestal. They are flagrantly manipulating history". The Diana myth is very far from the truth as far as some journalists are concerned. "The Cinderella come alive, was unable to assume the dignity of her position and her fairy tale turned into a nightmare". She was not, according to one report "prepared either intellectually or mentally to be clothed in purple and was consequently rejected by the Windsor family". However, "Diana built her own Kingdom in which she reigned supreme", according to one newspaper. "She had millions of loyal subjects who did not care if she was seen on board a multi million peseta yacht with her Arab lover only days after one of her overseas humanitarian campaigns. "Had they not just witnessed her humanity and compassion in her recent visited to Bosnia where she sympathised with the war wounded?". It did not matter to most that the Princess of "A Thousand and One Arabian Nights" was capable of spending more on manicures in a month than the average British worker earned in one year. "Diana pursued love, money and power, not necessarily in that order. She was never content with being just the wife of the Prince of Wales". It was pointed out that within two years of her marriage, she was more popular than her husband and Queen Elizabeth, rivaling only the popularity of the Queen Mother. Most commentaries on Diana have emphasised that, despite her insistence that the media hounded her continually, she in fact was a "master in the art of communication". "She flaunted her private life in the assurance that the British public loved and adored her". Spanish national newspaper El Mundo recently opened its Internet pages inviting people to ask questions or give their personal opinion on the accident and the Diana "myth".

Perhaps recent declarations by Gadafi that the British were a "vile, racist nation" and that the State could not support the idea of an Arab being the stepfather of a future King, prompted some of the queries. One of the interrogations on Internet put forward the following theory "Ask MI5 (British Secret Service) what happened. This is not like GAL or ETA (terrorism in Spain). MI5 are clean and effective in the typical English style. Diana's death has seriously affected her children and Camila Parker but only the Royal Family gains from her death". Another theory put forward was that one of the paparazzi was in fact a hired assassin whose camera was in reality a gun which was used to kill the driver of the Mercedes, causing the car to crash. The Internet response has prompted El Mundo to open a file called "Alt. Conspiracy: Who killed lady Di". This may sound rather far fetched but in fact several journalist have pointed out that the assassination theory is not completely ridiculous. Some believe that there exists a "super power dealing in dirty state politics which far from being fictitious like a James Bond novel could hold some element of truth". On a lighter note, some TV viewer can thank Diana for one thing. Tombola a controversial TV programme was taken off the air after Sunday's "tasteless" review of Diana's life and the accident. Although there have been numerous conflicting press opinions on Diana's short life as a Royal, the general opinion is that she indeed lived a sad, unfortunate existence but in death she will be "Queen of Hearts" forever.

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