Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have just returned to California after a three-day trip to Nigeria, to tie into Harry’s role in the Invictus Games, and while the trip was largely deemed successful from a PR standpoint, Harry is said to have been left “bitter” about it behind the scenes.
According to what Royal expert Tom Quinn told The Mirror, the lack of support his family have shown for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s Nigeria trip has soured the experience for Harry. As Quinn put it, “for Harry every success is another kind of failure while his family refuse to acknowledge his efforts and steadfastly refuse to apologise for everything that had happened in the past.”
As for why the Royals might not be pleased with the Sussexes’ Nigeria visit, PR expert Lynn Carratt told the same publication that, to the Palace, this may have appeared as another instance of Harry and Meghan doing whatever they like outside of Royal protocol.
“These faux-Royal tours could deepen their rift with the Royal Family, if not handled correctly,” Carratt noted. “Their Nigerian tour bared all that hallmarks of a Royal Tour which was said to [have] infuriated the palace.”
The obvious solution would be for Harry to extent an olive branch to his father and brother, so they could all bury the hatchet. Unfortunately, it sound like this is unlikely to happen anytime soon, even during this time of extreme upheaval for the Windsors.
King Charles and Prince William may never welcome Harry back into the fold, and here’s why
As per what Royal correspondent Richard Fitzwilliam likewise told The Mirror, there’s no way back into The Firm — as the Royal Family’s inner circle is known — for Harry due to both King Charles and Prince William being intent on keeping him on the outside.
Their hard stance allegedly stems from Harry and Meghan’s decision to share so many private secrets with the media and the press since they split from the Royal household in 2019. Apparently, this is something that the King and the Prince of Wales just can’t forgive.
“After the Oprah interview, the Harry and Meghan Netflix documentary and the publication of Harry’s memoir Spare, as well as the interviews he gave promoting it,” Fitzwilliam claimed, “the popularity of the royal family suffered and the Sussexes were considered to have gone rogue.”
Fitzwilliam went on to argue that the root of the problem is that there is no trust between the family members anymore.
“The biggest casualty was trust,” he stated. “It is unsurprising that King Charles and Prince William no longer trust Harry and Meghan.”
We shouldn’t be too surprised to hear a Royal reconciliation isn’t on the cards, given that Harry just made a whistle-stop return to his native U.K. only to not even check in on his ailing father. Not to mention that he was as in the dark about Kate Middleton’s cancer diagnosis as the rest of us.