Berlusconi: even the loyal spokesman Paolo Bonaiuti leaves your sinking Forza Italia for the New Centre-Right?

Sunday, 14 April 2014. As Forza Italia (Go Italy) appears to be losing more and more voters, Paolo Bonaiuti decides to leave the party to follow Berlusconi's former dauphin Angelino Alfano into the Nuovo Centrodestra (New Centre-Right).

“It was a difficult and painful decision,” said the 74-year-old Paolo Bonaiuti, announcing his divorce from Berlusconi's Forza Italia (Go Italy) 2.0, the party re-founded by Berlusconi, when he decided to ditch the PDL (People of Freedom Party), in a virtual night of the long knives to get rid of some of his opponents.

Sometimes it was painful for Mr Bonaiuti (centre) to be on Berlusconi's side.

It's “a decision I have delayed for a long time, but fully motivated by political differences and personal incomprehension that have deepened in the past year.” said Bonaiuti, who has been Berlusconi's public face for a long long time. 

Berlusconi: it's me who sent Dell'Utri to Lebanon, to help Amine Gemayel, because Vladimir Putin asked me to do so.

Sunday, 13 April 2014. The mystery around the disappearance of Berlusconi's aide Marcello Dell'Utri gets more and more mysterious, as the fugitive is backed up by the former prime minister (who - in turn - says the idea was Vladimir Putin's...).

The first news to hit the headlines was that in the run up to a definitive sentence regarding the accusations of links to the Sicilian Mafia, prosecutors weren't able to locate Berlusconi's long-time friend and aide Mr Dell'Utri, and therefore he was declared “fugitive” by the Italian magistrates.

Marcello Dell'Utri and Berlusconi: 

Then Dell'Utri's mobile phone was traced in Beirut, even though his lawyers issued a statement (last Friday) saying that he never went to Lebanon, he was in France, and he never meant to escape, he was just being cured (underwent a angioplasty surgery).

Berlusconi: awaiting the ruling over his sentence, he has been visiting social workers and hospitals

Monday, 7 April 2014. In the run-up to Thursday's discussion over his sentence, Berlusconi visits a social worker and a hospital, just in case.

As Silvio Berlusconi already did in the past (do you remember the uveitis case, almost exactly one year ago?), before any ruling against him, he boast of some minor injuries or diseases, and spends sometime in a hospital.

Berlusconi knows a thing or two, about avoiding trials...

This is just in case he is in the mood to appeal to a “legitimate impediment” and avoid the trial (and killing four birds with one stone: skipping the humiliation, holding up the proceedings, one of his specialities, raising commiseration and gaining visibility, as the Italian media will talk about it).