Flick through TV channels in Italy and chances are high that, sooner rather than later, you would come across an 81-year-old man speaking in an agitated manner.

He sports a full shock of jet-black hair which must rank as one of the proudest achievements of the plastic surgery industry, sparkling-white teeth which only a high-class dentist can provide and carefully-applied make-up - just enough to give him that eternal blush of youth.

He is, of course, Mr Silvio Berlusconi, the man who frequently scandalised Europe but who has dominated Italian political life for decades, and is about to do so again.

For as Italy's electoral campaign gets under way in the run-up to the ballots on March 4, the only certainty is that the octogenarian media tycoon will be the king-maker in Rome, and get to decide who runs the country.

Mr Berlusconi has elevated the link between business and politics to a form of art. And he is the ultimate survivor; despite criminal convictions and electoral setbacks, he never leaves the scene. He just recycles himself.

Mr Berlusconi's life is a true journey from rags to riches.

Growing up in poverty-stricken Italy after World War II, he first made a living selling vacuum cleaners, then moved to singing in nightclubs and cruise ships.

He also went to university to study law, a clever choice since he would spend most of his life in courts - albeit not as a practitioner but as a defendant, accused of various offences.

He first established a construction company which subsequently morphed into Italy's biggest media conglomerate. He is estimated to be worth around €6.6 billion (S$10.9 billion), and enjoys nothing better than displaying his wealth.

Mr Berlusconi spotted an opportunity to enter politics during the early 1990s, after the entire political structure which ruled Italy melted under allegations of corruption and nepotism.

And as implausible as it may seem today, he initially came across as a breath of fresh air, a businessman determined to revive the country's creative spirit.

He certainly revolutionised Italian politics, although not in ways most people expected. His right-wing Forza Italia party never attracted more than a fifth of the vote in all the elections it competed in over the past three decades.

But Mr Berlusconi was always careful to have with him one or two other splinter parties even further to the right of the political spectrum - a tactic which allowed him to crowd out any other competitors.

The man initially dismissed by Italy's political elite as an accident rather than a product of democracy ended up as Italy's longest-serving premier since World War II.

That is despite - or, perhaps, because - of his scandalous private life, which constantly shocks fellow politicians but amuses the public.

His second wife, 20 years his junior, left him at the beginning of this decade, after Mr Berlusconi spent most of his time with an 18-year-old girl who used to call him "papi" (daddy).

Berlusconi also boasted about the fact that a significant share of his candidates for national and European elections were women, although most of them appear to have been chosen for their physical - rather than their political - profiles.

As prime minister, Mr Berlusconi was also associated with a 17-year-old Moroccan belly dancer who alleged that she has participated, together with 20 other women, in an African-style nude dancing prance known as the "bunga-bunga" at the premier's villa.

Mr Berlusconi seldom denies any of these dalliances. He merely denies having to pay for such encounters, since he claims that most women naturally fall for his irresistible charms.

Throughout his life, he also denied any other legal wrongdoing, although he was charged no less than 30 times with a variety of criminal offences, which included sex with minors, tax evasion and alleged offers to bribe judges.

By his own estimates, he made over 2,000 court appearances, and may have spent more than €230 million in lawyers' fees. But he was invariably acquitted, or escaped conviction due to amnesties or legal immunities.

But he has a current conviction for tax fraud that bars him from public office until the end of next year.

Still, that does not prevent him from riding high in the opinion polls. He and his associates are predicted to get a third of the votes to be cast in the March 4 elections, largely on promises to cut taxes and postpone the reform of pension payments - a popular cause in a rapidly ageing nation.

As always, Mr Berlusconi is ready to go into coalition with anyone, provided he exercises power from behind the scenes. That way, he candidly explained to a TV interviewer recently, "we always have the possibility of making our allies bear the responsibility for the promises we did not keep".