page_title: Political career of Silvio Berlusconi
section_title: The "running board revolution": 2008 electoral victory and formation of a new party
hierarchical_section_title: Political career of Silvio Berlusconi / Political career / The "running board revolution": 2008 electoral victory and formation of a new party
caption_attribution_description: English: PdL logo
context_page_description: The political career of Silvio Berlusconi began in 1994, when Berlusconi entered politics for the first time serving intermittent terms as Prime Minister of Italy from 1994 to 1995, 2001 to 2006 and 2008 to 2011, his career was racked with controversies and trials; amongst these was his failure to honour his promise to sell his personal assets in Mediaset, the largest television broadcaster network in Italy, in order to dispel any perceived conflicts of interest.
context_section_description: Following the run-up to the 2006 general election there had been talk among some of the components of the House of Freedoms regarding a possible merger into a "united party of moderates and reformers". Forza Italia, the National Alliance party of Gianfranco Fini, and the Union of Christian and Centre Democrats of Pier Ferdinando Casini all seemed interested in the project. Soon after the election, however, Casini started to distance his party from its historical allies.
  
  On 2 December 2006, during a major demonstration of the centre-right in Rome against the government led by Romano Prodi, Silvio Berlusconi proposed the foundation of a "Freedom Party", stressing that the people and the voters of the different political movements adhering to the demonstration were all part of a "people of freedom".
  On 18 November 2007, after claiming the collection of more than 7 million signatures (including Umberto Bossi's) demanding the President of the Republic Giorgio Napolitano to call a fresh election, Silvio Berlusconi announced from the running board of a car in a crowded Piazza San Babila in Milan that Forza Italia would have soon merged or transformed into The People of Freedom party. Berlusconi also stated that this new political movement could see the participation of other parties. Both supporters and critics of the new party called Berlusconi's announcement "the running board revolution".
  After the sudden fall of the Prodi II Cabinet on 24 January, the break-up of The Union coalition and the subsequent political crisis (which paved the way for a fresh general election in April 2008), Berlusconi, Gianfranco Fini and other party leaders finally agreed on 8 February 2008 to form a joint list named "The People of Freedom" (Italian: Il Popolo della Libertà), allied with the Northern League of Umberto Bossi and with the Sicilian Movement for Autonomy of Raffaele Lombardo.
  In the snap parliamentary elections held on 13/14 April 2008 this coalition won against Walter Veltroni's centre-left coalition in both houses of the Italian Parliament.
  In the 315-member Senate of the Republic, Berlusconi's coalition won 174 seats to Veltroni's 134. In the lower house, Berlusconi's conservative bloc led by a margin of 9% of the vote: 46.5% (344 seats) to 37.5% (246 seats). Berlusconi capitalised on discontent over the nation's stagnating economy and the unpopularity of Prodi's government. His declared top priorities were to remove piles of trash from the streets of Naples and to improve the state of the Italian economy, which had underperformed the rest of the Eurozone for years. He also said he was open to working with the opposition, and pledged to fight tax evasion, reform justice and reduce public debt. He intended to reduce the number of Cabinet ministers to 12. Berlusconi and his ministers (Berlusconi IV Cabinet) were sworn in on 8 May 2008.
  On 21 November 2008 the National Council of Forza Italia, chaired by Alfredo Biondi and attended by Berlusconi himself, dissolved Forza Italia and established The People of Freedom, whose inauguration took place on 27 March 2009, the 15th anniversary of Berlusconi's first electoral victory.
  While Forza Italia had never held a formal party congress to formulate its rules, procedures, and democratic balloting for candidates and issues, (since 1994 three party conventions of Forza Italia have been held, all of them resolving to support Berlusconi and reelecting him by acclamation) on 27 March 2009 at the foundation congress of the People of Freedom political movement the statute of the new party was subject to a vote of approval. On 5820 voting delegates 5811 voted in favour, 4 against and 5 abstained. During that political congress Silvio Berlusconi was elected as Chairman of the People of Freedom by handraising. According to the official minutes of the congress the result favoured Berlusconi, with 100 percent of the delegates voting for him.
caption: The People of Freedom
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