Berlusconi and Covid-19

Thursday, 3 September 2020. 83-year old - almost 84, actually - former PM Silvio Berlusconi is admitted to Milan’s hospital having tested positive to Covid-19 and apparently suffering from double pneumonia. He had been hanging about with friends (who also tested positive to the virus) without wearing a mask.

Silvio Berlusconi, whose 84th birthday is now three weeks away, was tested positive for Covid-19 last Wednesday, after holidaying in Sardinia. Due to his age, last Thursday he was admitted to Milan’s San Raffaele hospital, where a virus-related ‘mild’ lung infection has been diagnosed (earlier Berlusconi’s doctor, Dr Zangrillo, stated that an asymptomatic Berlusconi was quietly isolating in his home in Arcore). According to Berlusconi’s fellow politicians, it’s only “a small precautionary hospitalisation”, rumours about Berlusconi having been checked into intensive care have been denied. 

Flavio Briatore (70) and Silvio Berlusconi (83) met in Sardinia in August 2020 (YouTube)

The swab was administered to the former Italian Prime Minister when he came back from Sardinia, where he met a good friend, Flavio Briatore, a former Formula 1 team manager and businessman who owns the Billionaire nightclub, and who has also been tested positive for the virus. The two, Berlusconi and Briatore, met in Sardinia in August, where photos were taken and neither was wearing a mask. 

Berlusconi's naval accident in Saint-Tropez

Thursday, 13 August 2015. The 78-year old former PM Silvio Berlusconi is victim of an accident while on holiday with his daughter Marina and his grandchildren in south France.

Silvio Berlusconi was trying to get back from terra firma to his yacht, when he – as a captain courageous - banged his head on the canopy of a boat, suffering a slight cut on the forehead and consequent dizziness.

Banga-banga ouch!

The former Italian PM is officially on holiday – with his daughter Marina (her birthday was celebrated last Monday), her husband Maurizio Vanadia and her two sons, Gabriele and Silvio – even though in the meantime he is trying to flog his beautiful villa in Sardinia to some members of the Saudi royal family. 

Berlusconi reveals that Putin has offered him the Russian citizenship and a post as Economy Minister

Thursday, 23 July 2015. During a dinner with Forza Italia's MPs, Silvio Berlusconi reveals that his friend Vladimir Putin offered him the Russian citizenship and the post of head of the Economy Ministry.

The Italian newspaper La Stampa (“The Press”) has gathered information about something quite controversial that the disgraced former Italian PM Silvio Berlusconi apparently said yesterday evining, during a dinner at Ristorante Consolini in the district of Testaccio, in Rome.

Is Silvio Berlusconi saying farewell to Italy?

 According to the report Berlusconi arrived at the premises just 5 minutes late, which is exceptionally early for his habits, with a gloomy face, and then sat at a table packed with women, among them the faithful and busty Mariarosaria Rossi, the blonde Micaela Biancofiore (yes, the one of the homophobic remark...), and the lovely Gabriella Giammanco.

Pippo Inzaghi sacked from AC Milan, apart from flirting or not with Barbara Berlusconi

Tuesday, 16 June 2015. AC Milan communicates that head coach Filippo “Pippo” Inzaghi has been sacked, without explaining whether flirting with Barbara Berlusconi – AC Milan's owner's daughter and member of board of directors – has been a reason why...

After just one year in charge, Filippo Inzaghi (aka Pippo) has been dismissed by Silvio Berlusconi-owned AC Milan (he was informed a week before the official statement from the club). The handsome-looking former striker of the club was thought to had have an affair with the young and provoking daughter of Silvio Berlusconi, Barbara, but rumours had been dismissed by all the parts (AC Milan included).

Filippo Inzaghi - aka Pippo - looking for a new job

Apart from the gossips regarding Inzaghi's love affairs, his record as a manager is rubbish, the Rossoneri – as AC Milan are frequently called – finished the 2014-2015 season in 10^th place on Serie A's table, one of the worst results ever. This result alone could justify the divorce from the club.

Barbara Berlusconi is flirting with AC Milan's coach Filippo “Pippo” Inzaghi, or not?

Tuesday, 25 November 2014. AC Milan and its coach Filippo “Pippo” Inzaghi have realeased a note saying that no flirting occurred between Barbara Berlusconi – AC Milan's owner's daughter and member of board of directors – and the club's former star.

“Barbara Berlusconi and Filippo Inzaghi have instructed their lawyers to take legal action against all the media who report the news of an alleged relationship. The news is in fact false and totally invented.” says the note issued by the daughter of AC Milan's owner, and by the handsome new manager of the team.

Barbara Berlusconi with Filippo Inzaghi, widely known as Pippo

The official denial was provoked by a number of articles appeared on Italian gossip and sport media, suggesting that something happened between the 41-year-old manager and the 30-year-old executive of AC Milan. Executive, and daughter of AC Milan's owner Silvio Berlusconi, to be precise.

Berlusconi explains what have in common Beppe Grillo, Robespierre, Pol Pot, Hitler and Stalin

Friday, 2 May 2014. Interviewed by Nicola Porro – unbiased journalist and employee of the Berlusconi's family (does this work?) – Silvio Berlusconi gives the Italian a history's lesson and an advice on whom they shouldn't vote for.

Par condicio (Latin for equal treatment)is a most fashionable word in Italy, when it comes to electoral campaigns, it stands for fairness doctrine (if you trust Wikipedia), id est (if it has to be Latin, so be it!) giving the same opportunities to politicians to get exposed by the media.

How can you vote for someone who is as bad as Robespierre and Marx were, asks Mr Berlusconi...

Nicola Porro is the anchorman hosting Virus, a talk show on Italy's national TV broadcaster Rai2, as well as the vice director of Berlusconis-owned Il Giornale newspaper, and he is very keen on giving the three leaders of the three major Italian parties the same chances to appear on his show. 

Berlusconi set to start community services with dementia and Alzheimer's disease patients

Wednesday, 30 April 2014. Berlusconi is set to start community services on 9 May, with Alzheimer's disease and dementia patients at Catholic-run Insitute.

As a social carer (doing that job is the way chosen to make him pay his debt with society) Mr Berlusconi is going to do real work, not just sit behind a desk, according Paolo Pigni, head of the Catholic-run Fondazione Sacra Famiglia (Sacred Heart Foundation), in Cesano Boscone, near Milan.

According to Mr Berlusconi community service is “ridiculous, not only for me but for the whole country

The news was disclosed during a press conference where it was also said that the former Italian prime minister will work in the part of the centre where people with dementia and Alzheimer's disease are being taken care of. 

Berlusconi: here's what he can do and what he can't do during his term as a social worker

Wednesday, 23 April 2014. As Mr Berlusconi signs Milan's Surveillance Court prescriptions' document regarding his term as a social worker, becomes clear to him what he is allowed to do and what he isn't.

Silvio Berlusconi will serve his sentence for tax fraud by helping in at Sacra Famiglia (Sacred Family) elderly people’s home in Cesano Boscone (east of Milan, about 25 miles away from his villa in Arcore), where he signed a documents detailing the term.

You choose the sentence for Silvio Berlusconi, a game by to The Guardian

There are 12 prescriptions in the document, and the former prime minister of Italy can't really complain, as the house arrest – which was one of the options on the table – would have involve more constrictions than his job as a social worker, 4 hours a week.

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: 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).

Berlusconi is portrayed by good friend and full time pensioner George W Bush

Friday, 4 April 2014. 67-year-old George W Bush portrays world leaders – among them 77-year-old Berlusconi – showing how retirement can be a nice period of our lives.

As a world leader George W Bush has collected a few critics (even though he won Mr Berlusconi's long-lasting friendship), here and there, but you have to admit that as a amateur painter he has a knack, as he unveiled an exhibitions of his works, dubbed “The Art of Leadership: A President’s Personal Diplomacy”.

Silvio Berlusconi, as seen by good pal George W Bush

There are 24 characters portrayed by the former president of the USA, like his very father George H W Bush, Russia's president Vladimir Putin, former UK's prime minister Tony Blair, the Dalai Lama and – of course - the disgraced ex-prime minister of Italy Silvio Berlusconi (currently out of work as a politician, due to his judicial woes).

Berlusconi and the mystery of the European election's logo

Wednesday, 2 April 2014. The Forza Italia logo for the European elections shows the name “Berlusconi”, but if Silvio can't run as a candidate, who is going to be that?

Silvio Berlusconi can't run as a candidate for public office due to his interdiction to public posts, Italian highest court had made it clear last month, when the former prime minister's lawyer appealed against the ruling, which followed the definitive conviction of the media tycoon for tax fraud. 

Forza Italia's logo and slogan: “"More Italy in Europe, less Europe in Italy”

But, then, who is going to put a face to the Berlusconi name written in big blue letters over the Forza Italia (Go Italy) party's logo for the election, just below the tricolour banner and between a menace printed on the left (“Piu' Italia in Europa”, “More Italy in Europe”), and a wrote bad omen on the right (“Meno Europa in Italia”, “Less Europe in Italy”)?

Berlusconi: is Ruby the Heart Stealer using your money in Mexico and Dubai?

Friday, 28 March 2014. According to the Italian newspaper La Repubblica Berlusconi's favourite night dancer Karima El Mahroug (aka Ruby the Heart Stealer) has started a new life, taking expensive holidays, developing a luxury resort in Mexico and investing in property in the Middle East. Where did she get the money from?

Karima El Mahroug – aka Ruby the Heart Stealer – is a young former erotic dancer (she is now 21) who took part in the bunga-bunga parties in Berlusconi's villa in Arcore and who is believed to have had sex with the owner of the manor in 2010 when she was still under-age (and Mr Berlusconi was sentenced to a 7-year term in jail for having slept with her and for having used his power as Italy's prime minister to try and hide the story).

Ruby the Heart Stealer (real name Karima El-Mahroug) having pretty good time in Mexico (Playa del Carmen's beach)

Now, in 2010 the prosecutors in charge with the sex scandal trial (the result of the so-called Rubygate investigation) intercepted a phone conversation when Ruby – talking to a friend – said that she had received €5 million from the billionaire (which is roughly £4.1m or $6.9).

Later on the Moroccan erotic dancer (and call-girl, if you listen to Milan's judges), said that all that stuff (and other stuff she had been telling the judges) was just a made-up show off and she had been “talking crap”, and so on.

Berlusconi: riding cats and dogs to gain support

Sunday, 30 March 2014. In a desperate attempt to gain support in the run-up to May European Elections, Silvio Berlusconi has become a strenuous campaigner for animal adoption.

The Mr Berlusconi is looking for a tiger to ride, in order to gain some support at least within his ageing target group, the young pensioners, and show that ditching the People of Liberty movement (Popolo della Libertà) and re-founding his old party “Forza Italia” (Go Italy o Forward Italy, according to the interpretations) was, all in all, a pretty good idea.

“This dog is my happiness” says a visibly satisfied Berlusconi on the Facebook page of Dudù,
Francesca Pascale's pet (photograph: Forza Dudù)

So far the disgraced politician (who was sentenced for tax fraud, booted from parliament, banned from travelling abroad, and his woes related to the bunga-bunga parties sex scandal are far from over) has been clutching at straws, lacking a proper wild beast, he is now experimenting with cats and dogs, playing the role of the wise and nice elderly man (his look had already been changed accordingly). Beggers can't be choosers

Berlusconi: AC Milan makes me lose 50 million a year

Wednesday, 25 March 2014. During a meeting with MPs from the Italian region of the Marches, Silvio Berlusconi stated that maintaining the football team has a cost of 50m euro a year (£42m or $69m), which is a bit annoying, given the results.

During a gathering at Villa Grazioli, his residence in Rome, Silvio Berlusconi couldn't help talking about the AC Milan, at least with the supporters of the rossoneri among a selection of members of parliament representing his party Forza Italia.

When AC Milan was successful: Berlusconi with coach Ancelotti and captain Maldini
Photograph: New Press/Getty

Apparently one of the milanisti said “Mr President, you should do something, I am so sorrow that such an important team is in such a situation” hinting at the fact that the club is virtually out of all competitions and AC Milan seem to be free-falling.

Berlusconi: Putin is a good boy and it is reckless to ban Russian from the G8

Wednesday, 25 March 2014. During a quick interview, Silvio Berlusconi affirms that the decision to suspend Russia from the G8 is “reckless, antihistorical and counterproductive”.

Silvio Berlusconi and Vladimir Putin are good pals, and apparently invading a NATO nation is not a misconduct serious enough, in the eyes of the Italian disgraced politician, to condemn the Russian president, so he keeps on defending him even after the annexation of Crimea and the seizing of Ukraine military bases.

The playful Berlusconi and Putin in Sardinia in 2003

The decision to suspend Russia from the G8 taken during the meeting in The Hague is a “reckless” and “antihistorical” decision, far from the “constructive spirit” that characterised the “long and weighty diplomatic work” the former Italian prime minister went through in order to endorse Putin. Furthermore that will cause the downsizing of the forum to 7 members (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom) and – therefore – the remaking of all the logos and merchandising. 

Berlusconi states that none of his children will seek seats during the European elections

Saturday, 22 March 2014. During a Forza Silvio Club gathering in Rome, Silvio Berlusconi makes clear that none of his children intends to run as a candidate in the imminent European election.

Berlusconi trying to foresee the future (ANSA)

As Silvio Berlusconi was denied by Italy's highest court to ran for the EU elections, rumours spread that some of his sons and daughters would replace him, in order to boast of an elected “Berlusconi", but the former prime minister of Italy said that the reports spread buy the Italian media were “all inventions”.

Berlusconi’s eldest daughter and Mediaset executive, Marina Berlusconi, has been frequently highlighted as a possible heirs to her father, since his father's judicial woes started, but she has always denied having any intention to “run on to the pitch” (a phrase Silvio used when he decided to start a political career back in 1994).

Berlusconi: High court explains to former prime minister how the ban from public office works

Tuesday, 18 March 2014. Italian High Court explains to former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi how the ban from public office works, and that he cannot run as a candidate for the European Parliament.

“Yes, you're banned from public office for two year, and no, you cannot run for European Parliament” told the High Court to Silvio Berlusconi, who tried to convince them that he had a case for his appeal (appealing also to the European Court of Human Rights).

The only way for Mr Berlusconi to get back to politics might be an appointment from his friend Putin?

While he was at it, he appealed also against his expulsion from the Senate, another measure – like the interdiction from taking part in elections as a candidate – taken after Mr Berlusconi was found guilty of tax fraud. 

Berlusconi: is AC Milan club falling apart?

Monday, 17 March 2014. After a resounding 2-4 defeat at home against the humble Parma, AC Milan show all their weaknesses as the president Silvio Berlusconi point the finger against his long-time friend Galliani, ex-iconic player Carlo Maldini slams the team's management and Mario Balotelli (apparently) bangs Internazionale's player's grilfriend.

Parma FC players – among them AC Milan's reject Antonio Cassano – would have never dreamed of beating the rossoneri in San Siro, a few months ago, but now, as everybody seem to be able to beat Berlusconi's team (not only Atletico Madrid), things are different and the 2-4 win doesn't sound so uncanny. But still, AC Milan's fans did not take it well, and started to stage a protest.

Silvio Berlusconi and AC Milan's trophies
on an old photo from the times when the club was a successful team.

“[New coach] Seedor is not the problem” declared Silvio Berlusconi – who handpicked the Dutch after sacking Massimiliano Allegri - in a quick interview, “there are no discussions, he will be here next year as well”. Berlusconi's stubbornness is pretty well known in Italy, the supporter might be tempted to wait and see, instead of tackling head on the Cavaliere.

Berlusconi: former (blonde) entourage member is arrested for possession of 24 kg of cocaine

Thursday, 13 March 2014. A blonde that escorted Silvio Berlusconi on a trip to the G8 summit in Toronto has been seized at Rome's airport with 24 kg of cocaine.

Nobody is really surprised to see Mr Berlusconi hanging around with young blonde (or dark-haired, for that matters) women, now that you know him, but back in 2010 people were a bit puzzled to see a mysterious girl popping out of the prime minister's state aeroplane in Toronto, where he flew to take part in the G8 summit.

Federica Gagliardi, aka the White Lady, when she travelled with the prime minister
of Italy - Silvio Berlusconi - to Toronto's G8 Summit (2010)

At that time the good looking female's identity was kept secret – for a while – and she was then dubbed the “white lady” by the creative Italians, since she appeared in a completely milky dress, particularly visible as compared to Silvio Berlusconi's dark blue suit or the brilliant red of the Royal Canadian guards' jackets.