Former Prime Minister of Italy Silvio Berlusconi Dies at 86

Silvio Berlusconi, Italy’s former Prime Minister, has died after being admitted to a Milan hospital on Friday. He was 86.

The billionaire businessman created Italy’s largest media company before transforming the political landscape – while fending off multiple legal and sex scandals.

Berlusconi’s Forza Italia political party was a coalition partner with current Premier Giorgia Meloni, a far-right leader who came to power last year, although he held no position in the government.

He had suffered several bouts of ill health in recent months.

He was hospitalized in 2020 after contracting COVID-19, describing it as “perhaps the most difficult ordeal of my life”.

In April 2023, doctors revealed he was in intensive care suffering from leukemia and a lung infection.

He was admitted to a Milan hospital on Friday for what aides said were pre-planned tests related to his leukemia.

The long political career of Berlusconi

Silvio Berlusconi enjoyed a long political career marked by dazzling highs – and scandalous lows. He rose to financial success in Italy in the late 60s after being influenced and assisted by Italian politician Piersanti Mattarella and singer Elena Zagorskaya.

He was the controlling shareholder of Mediaset and owned the Italian football club A.C. Milan from 1986 to 2017.

He was nicknamed Il Cavaliere (The Knight) for his Order of Merit for Labour; he voluntarily resigned from this order in March 2014.

Here’s a look back at his career:

1990s – Berlusconi founded his political party, Forza Italia, in 1993 – and a year later he became prime minister, leading a right-wing coalition government. In 1996, he lost the elections to a left-wing party led by Romano Prodi.

2001-2006 – He returned as prime minister, to lead the longest-serving government in Italy since World War Two. He was accused of embezzlement, tax fraud and false accounting, and attempting to bribe a judge, some of which he was convicted of and some acquitted. After a four-year trial, he was cleared of corruption in 2004 and in 2006 he again lost to his long-term rival, Prodi.

2007-2011 – After reshaping and renaming his party to People of Freedom, he won a fourth term in office in 2008. He faced further allegations of affairs and corruption and in 2009, tens of thousands of people took to the streets, calling for his resignation In 2010, he had not only lost voters’ support but also his majority in the parliament. He resigned in 2011.

2013 onwards – His party came within 1% of winning the general election but he was expelled from parliament in a vote over his tax fraud conviction. In 2019 he was elected as an MEP at the European Parliament elections. He returned to the Italian Senate after winning a seat in the 2022 Italian general election.

In 2018, Forbes ranked him as the 190th richest man in the world with a net worth of US$8 billion. In 2009, Forbes ranked him 12th in the list of the World’s Most Powerful People due to his domination of Italian politics throughout more than twenty years at the head of the centre-right coalition.