Sex, lies, and the scandalous life of Italy’s Silvio Berlusconi

He once described himself as the “Jesus Christ of politics”. A billionaire media mogul, he became Italy’s longest-serving president. Silvio Berlusconi, who died at 86 on Monday, dominated public life for decades and always courted controversy. Berlusconi suffered ill health for years and had recently been diagnosed with leukaemia. He attended a check-up at Milan’s San Raffaele Hospital on Friday. Three days on, it announced he passed away. In a video message, Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni said that Berlusconi was “one of the most influential men in Italy’s history”. He was elected PM three times and served for nine years, longer than anyone since dictator Benito Mussolini. He had taken a step back from public life recently but continued to head the right-wing Forza Italia party, a junior partner in Meloni’s coalition government. The larger-than-life character was a sort of Trump before Trump. He wielded huge influence through his television and newspaper interests; he effectively invented commercial TV in Italy and once owned the AC Milan football club. He was Italy’s richest person for a decade and often hit headlines for all the wrong reasons. We take a look at the life of Silvio Berlusconi, marred by scandals. The Bunga, Bunga parties In February, the former Italian premier was acquitted in an underage prostitution case that led to his downfall a decade ago. He was found not guilty of bribing witnesses to lie about his infamous “bunga bunga” parties he held at his villa in Arcore, a small town outside Milan when he was the PM. The billionaire media mogul was accused of bribing 24 guests at his parties to give false testimony in a previous trial where he was accused of paying for sex with 17-year-old Moroccan nightclub dancer Karima el-Mahroug, known by her stage name, Ruby Rubacuori, or Ruby Heartstealer. The “bunga bunga” parties were “lavish sex parties” where young women allegedly danced and stripped for Berlusconi. [caption id=“attachment_12728292” align=“alignnone” width=“640”] Karima El-Mahroug, aka. Ruby, at a Milan special courthouse in February 2023, following a decision on whether Berlusconi bribed witnesses to lie about his “bunga bunga” parties in an underage prostitution case. An Italian court on acquitted former PM Berlusconi of bribing witnesses to lie about his controversial parties. AFP[/caption] Prosecutors listed 33 women that they alleged were paid to have sex with the politician. They said these parties followed the same pattern; starting with dinner which had foods in red, white and green of Italy’s tricolour flag and ending with Berlusconi choosing “one or more women with whom he spent the night in an intimate relationship”, The Mirror reported. Imane Fadil, a Moroccan model who was a regular guest at these parties, testified in 2012 against the former prime minister, revealing that women dressed up as nuns and stripped while performing “raunchy pole dances”, the report added. Fadil died in March 2019 after being admitted to a hospital in Milan for severe stomach pains. Her death raised several questions as she had told her lawyer she had been poisoned. However, doctors later ruled out radioactive poisoning as a cause of death. In a public testimony in 2013, el-Mahroug had said that she attended about a half-dozen parties under her nickname Ruby and after each one Berlusconi handed her an envelope containing up to 3,000 euros ($3,900), reported AP. “The girls who were dressed in costumes approached him in a sensual way as they danced. They raised their skirts,” El-Mahroug testified then, as per AP. She claimed the bunga bunga sessions soon led to “orgies” among male and female guests. El-Mahroug told prosecutor Antonio Sangermano that Berlusconi “explained” to her that “bunga bunga consisted of a harem that he copied from his friend Gaddafi (the former Libyan dictator), in which the girls take their clothes off and have to provide physical pleasures”, the report noted. Berlusconi was sentenced to seven years in prison in 2013 for paying for sex with El-Mahroug but this was later overturned after the judge said there was reasonable doubt over whether he knew she was underage. ‘Cavorting with minors’ A relationship with another teenager led to the end of his second marriage with former actress Veronica Lario, who left him in 2009 over his “cavorting with minors”. In May of that year, when Berlusconi’s wife announced that she intended to file for divorce, it was reported that the then PM had attended the 18th birthday party of an aspiring actor and model, Noemi Letizia. The politician never explained his relationship with Letizia, who had also applied for a job on one of his television channels. In March 2022, he held a bizarre fake wedding with his girlfriend Marta Fascina, then 32. [caption id=“attachment_12728312” align=“alignnone” width=“640”] Silvio Berlusconi and his partner Marta Fascina are pictured in Milan, Italy, in February 2022. File photo/AP[/caption] The tax fraud case In all, Berlusconi faced 35 criminal court cases but was only convicted once definitively – in a 2012 tax fraud case regarding the sale of movie rights in his business empire. The Milan court in October 2021 sentenced him to four years but later cut it to a year because of a 2006 amnesty law aimed at reducing prison overcrowding. He would serve his year-long sentence through part-time community service in a home for elderly people. The court also banned him from holding public office for three years. The former PM was accused of buying US film rights for inflated prices via two offshore companies under his control. In the case, prosecutors argued that part of the money declared for the purchase of film rights was skimmed off to create illegal slush funds, reducing tax liabilities for Berlusconi’s Mediaset group, reports the BBC. [caption id=“attachment_12728322” align=“alignnone” width=“640”] A man reads a banner saying Forza Silvio (Go Silvio)" is seen in front of the San Raffaele Hospital in Milan, Italy, Monday. AP[/caption] Controversial statements On the world stage, Berlusconi was known for his friendships with the likes of Libya’s Gaddafi and Russian president Vladimir Putin. He controversially defended the latter following the invasion of Ukraine. In September last year, the Italian leader said that Putin just wanted to replace Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s government with “decent people”. Berlusconi had no time for traditional diplomacy, once likening a German European MP to a Nazi and describing former US president Barack Obama as “suntanned”. In December last year, he promised a “bus full of whores” to players of his Monza football team, which he bought in 2018 after he sold AC Milan. He also called Mussolini “benign” and said that the West “should be conscious of the superiority of our civilisation.” Berlusconi was Italy’s most colourful politician and also the most controversial one in recent history. With inputs from agencies Read all the Latest News, Trending News,  Cricket News, Bollywood News, India News and Entertainment News here. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.