Is it finally time to say ‘Bye-Bye Berlusconi?’
But this time, it may be different.
An Italian Senate committee last night proposed Berlusconi be expelled from parliament following his criminal conviction, dealing a further humiliating blow to the embattled billionaire tycoon. The senators, most of them leftist opponents of the three-time former premier, voted in favour of the motion which now has to go to the full Senate for final approval expected later this month.
After hours of talks, the head of the committee, Dario Stefano, said it had “decided by a majority to propose to the Senate assembly to debate invalidating the election of senator Berlusconi”.
Ejection from the Senate would mean Berlusconi being out of parliament for the first time since 1994, when the media and construction magnate first burst onto Italy’s political scene.
Renato Schifani, the chief senator from Berlusconi’s People of Freedom party, said the committee decision followed “a pre-written script”.
Berlusconi allies have said he could continue to lead his party even out of parliament but analysts say his failed challenge to Prime Minister Enrico Letta shows he has lost control of the party. Berlusconi’s Senate expulsion would happen under a law approved last year with votes also from his own party and aimed at cleaning up Italian politics by ridding parliament of criminals. He would also be barred from the next elections.
Berlusconi has now appealed to the European Court of Human Rights over the law, saying that it should not apply to him because his alleged crimes were committed before the legislation was approved.
Up until this week Berlusconi had been somewhat untouchable.
No tales of hot “bunga bunga” parties, nor charges of wrecking Italy’s economy, nor sex and bribery trials, nor the chants of “buffoon” that hounded him from office two years ago have been enough to remove Berlusconi from politics.
When he was forced to resign as premier in late 2011, the world’s media wrote Berlusconi’s political obituary. A year later, Berlusconi led his party to a strong election finish that returned him to the heart of Italian politics.
But now, it really may be time to say, “Bye-Bye Berlusconi.” On Wednesday, the billionaire mogul was forced into a devastating retreat in his campaign to bring down the government, after his own lieutenants rose up in mutiny. And now lawmakers look finally set to strip Berlusconi of his Senate seat — banishing him from politics.
So surely, surely there’s no way back for Silvio now?
Readers can judge for themselves in this chronicle of Berlusconi’s amazing escapes.
Berlusconi launched his political career in the 1990s as Italy’s great salesman, hawking his vision of can- do success to a mesmerised public. But he hasn’t been able to translate those communication skills on the international stage — committing gaffes that might have been fatal for other world leaders.
Facing criticism in 2003 at the European parliament by a German lawmaker, Berlusconi compared his adversary to a concentration camp guard: “Mr Schulz, I know there is in Italy a man producing a film on the Nazi concentration camps. I would like to suggest you for the role of Kapo. You’d be perfect.”
In 2005, Berlusconi bragged that he had to charm Finland’s president into giving up her nation’s bid to host a European food authority: “I had to use all of my playboy tactics,” he quipped. And after Barack Obama was elected in 2008, Berluconi saluted the new American president as “handsome, young and also suntanned”.
One was a teenage Moroccan dubbed by the press as “Ruby the Heart-stealer”. Another was a high-class hooker who produced tapes of Berlusconi allegedly sweet-talking her in his Rome residence. Then there was the 18-year-old Neapolitan who purportedly called him “Papi” — “Daddy” — and was the chief reason that his wife, disgusted with what she called his “cavorting with minors”, left him in 2009.
Berlusconi has never denied a weakness for beautiful women, saying with a twinkle in his eye that he’s “no saint”, but the endless stream of sleaze surrounding tales of “bunga bunga” parties has shadowed the latter part of his career — and landed him in legal trouble. This year, a court convicted Berlusconi of sex with a minor and abuse of power over his tryst with Ruby, whose real name is Karima El Mahroug.
At the end of a rambunctious 2009 filled with sex scandal, Berlusconi held a rally in Milan in which he declared, among other things, that he was a “good-looking” man.
After the speech, as Berlusconi waded through the adoring crowd toward his chauffeur-driven car, a man with a history of mental illness clubbed him with a souvenir replica of the Milan cathedral — smashing two teeth, breaking his nose and cutting his lip. The attack hardly slowed Berlusconi down. In fact, it provoked an outpouring of sympathy from around Italy, bolstering his standing at a delicate political time.
The jeers split the air outside Rome’s presidential palace and a band of revellers erupted in a rendition of Handel’s “Alleluia!” It was November 12, 2011 — and Berlusconi had just handed in his resignation.
The man who had cast a spell over Italy with his infectious optimism and spectacular success had finally lost the heart of a nation worn out by an endless stream of muck about sexual misdeeds, unbridled corruption and economic bungling that critics said had driven Italy to the brink of a financial abyss. Markets were panicking over Italy’s colossal debt, and even some of Berlusconi’s allies felt it was time for him to go.
But as his successor — the sober economist Mario Monti — pursued a policy of austerity that alienated Italians, Berlusconi began making rumbles of a comeback. When he launched his campaign, Berlusconi’s fuzzy promises of revival and tax largesse began to sound pretty good. Berlusconi’s party came in a strong second place — and went on to join Enrico Letta’s coalition government.
Then in August, Italy’s highest court put its stamp of finality on one of several Berlusconi graft convictions, capping years of legal wrangling in which the media tycoon filed appeal after appeal — all the while remaining Italy’s dominant political figure.
The four-year prison sentence would have been the death knell of any other politician. But not Berlusconi. No sooner had the court ruled than the conservative leader was back in attack mode — broadcasting a nationwide video in which he vowed to stay in politics and revive “Forza Italia!” (“Let’s Go Italy!”), the movement that launched his political career. He stayed out of jail under rules allowing the elderly to serve sentences at home or by carrying out community service.
Allies were soon predicting that the nation’s revered president would issue a pardon. And until this week’s dramatic events, Berlusconi made it clear that he was the one calling the shots in his political camp.
Berlusconi could still land in prison: He was handed a seven-year sentence in the Ruby case — and if he loses his appeal, it’s possible he’ll end up behind bars.
In the end, Berlusconi’s biggest enemies may have turned out to be his best friends. Throughout his career Berlusconi has been laid low time and again by allies who have betrayed him at critical moments. The media mogul’s love-hate, on-again-off-again political marriage with the populist Northern League is the key example: They caused his first government to collapse in 1994 when they yanked support amid noisy bickering.
Berlusconi also had a rocky partnership with the formerly neo-fascist National Alliance: In 2010, the party’s leader withdrew his backing for the government, triggering a no-confidence vote that Berlusconi barely survived. In 2011, it was a rebellion by members of Berlusconi’s own party that forced him to resign in disgrace, as markets lost confidence in Italy’s economy.
And on Wednesday, his top deputies balked at his order to bring down Letta’s government in a no-confidence vote — paving the way for last night’s vote to strip him of his Senate seat.
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