Who was Silvio Berlusconi, former Italian prime minister and tycoon embroiled in controversy?
Silvio Berlusconi passed away on Monday at the age of 86 due to leukemia. He was three times prime minister of Italy and media mogul, splashed by a barrage of scandals,
Nicknamed “the immortal” for his longevity in politics, the senator and businessman was admitted last Friday to a hospital in Milan, his hometown.
According to Italian media, he had stopped responding to his cancer treatment. He will have a state funeral on Wednesday in the Milan Cathedral.
A few minutes after the announcement of his death, dozens of people gathered in front of the San Raffaele hospital; later, reactions from the political and sporting world began to arrive.
Russian President Vladimir Putin was one of the first heads of state to react to Berlusconi’s death. He called him a “beloved person” and a “true friend”.
Berlusconi was one of the richest men in Italy, with a fortune evaluated at 6.4 billion euros by Forbes. He was a great communicator and a convinced anti-communist, loved and hated with equal intensity.
He was a bold and innovative entrepreneur who invented a peculiar and imitated commercial television format in the 1980s.
The politician who won three elections and led one of the longest post-war governments suffered from chronic leukemia.
His aura remained intact for decades thanks to his expansive personality and dissipated life; this landed him many times in the dock for corruption, witness buying and tax fraud.
Bunga bunga orgies.
Known for his ‘bunga bunga’ orgies and vulgar jokes, Berlusconi was a character abroad; as well as being an emblem of a rapidly growing Italy.
He was prime minister for nine years in total, between 1994 and 2011 and consolidated his immense wealth in the 1980s and 1990s.
Over the years, the ‘Cayman’, one of his numerous nicknames, underwent numerous surgeries on his face to rejuvenate himself. He used makeup to cover wrinkles and was often accompanied by a noticeably younger girlfriend.
The party he founded, Forza Italia, was recording a slow decline from 29.43% of the vote in the 2001 legislative elections to 8% in 2022; however, Berlusconi maintained his popularity among a portion of Italians.
“He is immoral, he will always be with us. I have always admired him (…) for his generosity, his gentleness and everything he did for us,” Carla Ballarini, a 75-year-old retiree who went to the hospital as soon as she heard of his death, told AFP.
The head of the Italian government, Giorgia Meloni, praised in a video the “courage” and “determination” of her ally; she considered him “one of the most influential men in the history of Italy.”
AC Milan lived one of its most glorious eras when Berlusconi was its leader (1986-2017); this morning it said it was “deeply saddened” by the death of its “unforgettable” former president.
On the judicial front, the tycoon spent years entangled in lawsuits filed over his controversial erotic feasts during his tenure as prime minister. These involved an underage girl of Moroccan origin, “Ruby the heartthrob”, whom he used to present as the niece of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.
For this scandal, also known as “Rubygate”, which aroused great interest in Italy and abroad, he was subjected to three trials.
He was acquitted for the crime of prostitution of a minor; however, he was prosecuted for bribing witnesses in that case, mostly models and prostitutes.
The power of Silvio Berlusconi
Born on September 29, 1936, son of a bank employee and law graduate, the origin of his enormous fortune has unleashed all kinds of speculation and remains uncertain.
There was even talk of the possibility that it came from loans made by the Sicilian Mafia.
With his private television channels, dotted with programs with almost naked women, he conquered the general public.
He also amassed millions with the real estate and financial sector until he reached politics, seducing both viewers and votes, although he did not manage to fulfill his greatest dream: that of becoming President of the Republic.
With the Fininvest holding company, which included three television channels, several newspapers and the Mondadori publishing house, he accumulated more power and his empire expanded internationally.
He was the forerunner of a style of millionaire politician that has been repeated worldwide, ignoring and disregarding ethical and moral principles.
The tycoon never gave up his businesses and companies, generating a debate on conflict of interest, but in November 2011 he had to relinquish the reins of an Italy plunged into a serious financial crisis.
Decorated as “Knight of Labor” (‘Cavaliere del Lavoro’) at the age of 41, he lost the title after the final sentence in 2013 to four years in prison for tax fraud in his company Mediaset and therefore expelled from the Senate after twenty years of continuous presence in parliament, before returning in 2022.
Father of five children from two marriages and several times grandfather, Berlusconi leaves no political heirs, but many economic ones, with the distribution of his immense patrimony.