Nine years after being expelled from parliament for a final conviction as a tax evader, Silvio Berlusconi has made a comeback to top Italian politics. Shortly before his 86th birthday, the former head of government confidently won the direct mandate for the Senate, the smaller of the two parliamentary chambers in Rome, in the city of Monza.
Berlusconi stood up for the right-wing alliance, which, alongside his conservative Forza Italia, also includes the radical right-wing Fratelli d'Italia and the right-wing populist Lega. After the clear success, Fratelli party leader Giorgia Meloni has the best chance of becoming prime minister.
Berlusconi has been prime minister four times in the past three decades. In addition to his politics, the entrepreneur made headlines primarily through scandals. In 2013, he was finally sentenced to four years in prison for tax fraud involving his media group.
Gina Lollobrigida clearly fails
Because of his age, he did not have to go to prison. However, the Senate withdrew his mandate, and Berlusconi was also banned from holding political offices for six years. Berlusconi's 32-year-old partner Marta Fascina was re-elected to the House of Representatives.
Unlike Berlusconi, other well-known personalities missed out on entering one of the two chambers. Acting Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio, for example, lost in his constituency in Naples. Because his Impegno Civico party, which he founded a few months ago after leaving the Five Star Movement, remained well below the three percent hurdle nationwide, he cannot enter the Chamber of Deputies via a list.
It was a similar experience for former Minister and ex-EU Commissioner Emma Bonino, who fought to get back into the Senate but failed.
The 95-year-old actress Gina Lollobrigida, who had been nominated by an anti-establishment party as a candidate for the Senate, but clearly failed, had no chance. Former Formula 1 driver Emerson Fittipaldi was also unsuccessful: he did not get enough votes as a candidate in the constituency of Italians living abroad.
Calogero Pisano, on the other hand, entered the Senate. Old social media posts by the Sicilian had been discovered in the past few days, in which he called Adolf Hitler a "great statesman". He apologized, his Fratelli d'Italia party promptly threw him out - but he's now in parliament anyway.
