The former Italian head of government Silvio Berlusconi, sulphurous billionaire as famous for his political maneuvers as for his legal disputes and sexual escapades, died Monday at 86 years old.
Treated at San Raffaele Hospital in Milan (North) for leukemia, the right-wing senator entered it on Friday. A state funeral will be held Wednesday at Milan Cathedral. The government proclaimed a national day of mourning for the occasion.
Shortly after the announcement of his death, dozens of people gathered outside the hospital, before his remains were transferred to his luxurious villa San Martino, in Arcore, on the outskirts of Milan, while the tributes flowed in from Italy and to a lesser extent from abroad.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, among the first to react, hailed a “dear person” and a “true friend” endowed with “incredible vital energy”, praising his “optimism” and his “sense of humor”.
A personal friend of Vladimir Putin, Silvio Berlusconi has repeatedly blamed kyiv for the war with Moscow.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, European Parliament President Roberta Metsola and European Council President Charles Michel soberly offered their condolences to his family and friends.
“Attached to our country, where he studied during his youth, Silvio Berlusconi took part, together with his French counterparts, in reaffirming the links between our two sister nations, strong in their common love of thought, sport, the arts, and of this European journey born of several centuries of shared history”, reacted French President Emmanuel Macron.
The journey of this eternal ghost, whose political death has been wrongly announced many times, merges with the Italian history of the last thirty years.
He was also one of the richest men on the peninsula with a fortune estimated in early April by Forbes at 6.4 billion euros.
Loved or hated, this assumed lover of women much younger than him, including call girls, has been involved in a myriad of lawsuits related to controversial receptions.
Abroad, he was best known for the string of scandals in which he was involved, his blunders that have become legendary, his repeated trials and his diplomatic stunts.
Pope Francis, himself hospitalized, hailed an “energetic temperament”, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “a great friend of Israel” and the head of the Hungarian nationalist government Viktor Orban “a great fighter”.
While he remained popular in Italy, his election-winning party Forza Italia, which he founded in 1994, followed his slow decline, dropping from almost 30% of the vote in the 2001 legislative elections to 8% in 2022.
In a video message, the head of the Italian government Giorgia Meloni praised his “courage” and his “determination”, seeing in him “one of the most influential men in the history of Italy”.
After starting his ascent in Milan in the construction industry, the unfailing entrepreneur had successfully launched into television, inventing the glitter TV of the 1980s which would make his fortune, allowing him to invest in football clubs. football, AC Milan then AC Monza.
On the scandal side, Mr. Berlusconi was sentenced to seven years in prison for underage prostitution and abuse of power for so-called “bunga-bunga” parties where very young women were invited, before being finally acquitted in 2015.
The octogenarian, whose last partner Marta Fascina was 53 years his junior, caused a scandal again in December 2022 when he promised his Monza players to bring “in the locker room” a “bus of whores” in case of victoire.
Over the years, the carnivorous smile of the “caiman”, one of his many nicknames, had however frozen on his lifted face with make-up “thick as the parquet floor”, a cruel expression of an editorialist.
Born on September 29, 1936, Berlusconi, the son of a Milanese bank employee, began working as an animator on cruise ships where he sang and told funny stories.
With a law degree, he launched into business, beginning an irresistible ascent that raised questions about the origin of his fortune, about which he had always remained unclear.
But it is above all in the television sector that his creative genius as a great communicator is expressed, which sprinkles his programs with naked women.
The Berlusconi family’s holding company, Fininvest, has three television channels, newspapers, Mondadori editions and many other holdings.
Football fan Silvio Berlusconi chaired AC Milan for 31 years, which won the Champions League five times under his era, before selling it in April 2017 to Chinese investors. “Thank you president, forever with us,” reacted the club on its website.
In 1994, he created Forza Italia, and following a lightning campaign relayed by his media empire, he became head of government before being released by his allies seven months later.
He returned to power in 2001 for five years, a post-war record. Beaten by a hair in 2006, he took his revenge two years later, taking control for the third time. But in November 2011, he had to give way under the boos of the reins of an Italy in the grip of a serious financial crisis.
He resurfaced in 2013 on the political scene by winning nearly a third of the votes in the legislative elections.
A few months later, the long litany of his legal setbacks led to his first final conviction for tax evasion: one year in prison – carried out in the form of community service in a home for the elderly -, six years of ineligibility and expulsion from the Senate.
Father of five children from two marriages, he was a grandfather several times.
12/06/2023 20:37:50 – Milan (AFP) – © 2023 AFP
