While eyes were on Meloni, Berlusconi has been making a comeback

Former leader Silvio Berlusconi is returning to Italy’s senate, after an almost 10-year absence – and may even end up getting a seat in the cabinet, writes David Harding

Centre-right Berlusconi has hitched himself to a government that legitimises the far right (AP)

With all the headlines generated by Giorgia Meloni’s success at the Italian general election, it was easy to miss that Silvio Berlusconi has made an astonishing political comeback.

His Forza Italia party is part of the alliance that should allow her to form a government and become Italy’s first female prime minister. Berlusconi is returning to Italy’s senate, after an almost 10-year absence – though he has been an MEP since 2019 – and may even end up getting a seat in the cabinet. During the campaign, where he used social media to hammer home his message a la Trump and Bolsonaro, he said grandly that he would be a “father figure” to Meloni. In some ways, he has acted as warm-up act for the pair.

It all seems vaguely amusing, the OAP lothario with an air of mischief and who looks like he has just walked out of a 1970s European disco, but it isn’t really.