Silvio Berlusconi, Italy’s ex-prime minister and media mogul, dies at 86

Former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, a billionaire businessman who created Italy’s largest media company before transforming the political landscape, died on Monday (12 June) aged 86.

Two members of the Italian government mourned his passing, with Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini calling him in a statement “a great man and a great Italian.”

Defence Minister Guido Crosetto wrote on Twitter that Berlusconi’s death amounted to the end of an era.

“I loved him very much. Farewell Silvio,” Crosetto said.

Berlusconi, who was prime minister during 1994-5, 2001-6 and 2008-11, had been suffering from leukaemia and had recently developed a lung infection.

Berlusconi’s Forza Italia party is part of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s right-wing coalition, and although he himself did not have a role in government, his death is likely to destabilise Italian politics in the coming months.

His business empire also faces an uncertain future. He never publicly indicated who would take full charge of his MFE company following his death, even though his eldest daughter Marina is expected to play a prominent role.

Businesses

Berlusconi controlled a diverse business empire through the Fininvest family holding and several related companies.

Fininvest

Berlusconi, who made his name by building a media empire in the 1980s and as owner of European soccer champions AC Milan, used Fininvest, a family holding company with assets worth 4.9 billion euros ($5.3 billion) at the end of 2021, to manage his interests.

Before his death, Silvio owned 61.3% of Fininvest, while Pier Silvio and Marina Berlusconi, his two children from his first marriage, each owned a 7.65% stake.

Barbara, Eleonora and Luigi Berlusconi, his other three children, together owned 21.42% of Fininvest.

Marina Berlusconi has been chairwoman of Fininvest since 2005.

MediaForEurope

Formerly known as Mediaset, Italy’s top commercial broadcaster MediaForEurope is controlled by Fininvest, which owns a 48% stake. Its chief executive is Pier Silvio Berlusconi.

It operates free-to-air TV channels as well as streaming services in Italy and Spain. It also owns movie production and distribution company Medusa and holds a 40% stake in privately-held Italian broadcasting tower group EI Towers.

MFE had consolidated revenues of 2.9 billion euros in 2021.

It is the single biggest investor in German TV group ProSiebenSat.1Media, with a 29.9% stake.

French media giant Vivendi holds some 23% of MFE, mostly through a trust dubbed Simon Fiduciaria.

Mondadori

Fininvest owns 53% of Italy’s leading publisher, Mondadori, which dominates the domestic book market.

Marina Berlusconi has been Mondadori’s chairwoman since 2003. She also sits on MFE’s board.

Banca Mediolanum

Fininvest owns a 30% stake in the €6-billion Italian asset manager Banca Mediolanum.

AC Monza

After selling AC Milan in 2017 in a 740 million euro deal, Fininvest bought smaller soccer club AC Monza the following year. The team won promotion to Italy’s Serie A league in 2022 for the first time and ended their debut season in the middle of the table.

Many court battles, one sole conviction

Berlusconi was at the centre of a series of investigations and trials, almost all of them opened after he entered politics in 1994. In all, he faced 35 criminal court cases, but only clocked up one definitive conviction.

Under Italian law, a defendant, if convicted, has the right to appeal first to the appeals court, and then to the country’s top court, the Court of Cassation.

A sentence becomes enforceable, therefore, only once the appeals process has been exhausted. That takes several years and some alleged crimes are wiped due to the statute of limitations, which dictate how long investigations and trials can last.

‘Ruby’ cases

Berlusconi was accused of abuse of office and paying for sex in 2010 with a minor, nightclub dancer Karima El Mahroug, better known in Italy by her stage name, Ruby the Heartstealer.

Berlusconi was initially found guilty in 2013 and sentenced to seven years in jail. The verdict was overturned in 2014 by an appeals court which ruled there was no proof he had known that she was 17 at the time of the encounter. Italy’s top court confirmed his acquittal in 2015.

Berlusconi was put in the dock again in Rome, Siena and Milan after being accused of bribing witnesses at his so-called Bunga Bunga parties to lie in the original Ruby trial. He has been cleared in each city, most recently in February in Milan.

Single definitive conviction

The only Berlusconi trial that ended with a final conviction was one for tax fraud, false accounting and embezzlement tied to his media empire, which was then called Mediaset. In 2013, the top court confirmed Berlusconi’s sentence of four years’ imprisonment, three of which were covered by a pardon.

Given his age, the former prime minister was able to complete his sentence as community service from 2014 to 2015. He was banned from political office until 2018.

Acquittals

A total of 10 cases ended with an acquittal. Two of them, including the All Iberian party funding trial, were shut down “because the alleged fact no longer represents a crime” after his government changed the law to his benefit.

Seven resulted in acquittals “because the allegations did not prove to be founded”, including trials for alleged bribes to the tax police, bribes to judges and tax evasion. He was acquitted in one case because the judge ruled what had happened was not a crime.

Statute of limitations and amnesties

A further 10 trials against Berlusconi concluded with a decision not to pursue the case to a verdict, many because the statute of limitations came into force, bringing a guillotine down on proceedings, including a case where Berlusconi was originally found guilty of bribing a senator in 2006 to bring down the then centre-left government. A number of the cases were curtailed after a Berlusconi-led coalition reduced the statute of limitations for false accounting. He also benefitted from two amnesties.

Dropped cases

Another 10 proceedings ended with a preliminary judge deciding to drop the case without going to trial, including one where he was investigated for alleged connections to the mafia.

Case pending

A trial in which Berlusconi is accused of “inducing people to lie” is still pending in the court in the city of Bari.

He is accused of having paid a businessman to lie to magistrates investigating young women allegedly brought to his residence in Rome between 2008 and 2009, when he was prime minister. As in all the other cases, Berlusconi denied any wrongdoing. The case will be closed following his death.

(Edited by Georgi Gotev)

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