Malpensa Airport was renamed after Berlusconi, sparking a backlash

After operating for 70 years, Milan Malpensa International Airport is changing its name to Milan Silvio Berlusconi International Airport. This decision has sparked criticism, reports Rzeczpospolita.

The planned change was announced by the Minister of Transport, Matteo Salvini.

"Some on the left will surely be grumbling after decades of insulting, slandering, and accusing him. But Silvio made history in this country and it is entirely justified to name Milan's airport after him," Matteo Salvini told "Rzeczpospolita".

The newspaper adds that the opposition in Italy has criticized the decision to rename the airport.

"I find it unacceptable to change Malpensa to Silvio Berlusconi. The former prime minister was a politician who caused deep divisions, and he had a very morally questionable past," Pierfrancesco Majorino, leader of the Democratic Party in the Lombardy Regional Council, told the newspaper.

Silvio Berlusconi died last year at the age of 86. He was not only a three-time Prime Minister of Italy and the founder of the Forza Italia party but also a billionaire listed among the wealthiest people in the world and the creator of a business empire.

In the 1970s, Berlusconi became a construction entrepreneur and built the first housing estate in Milan—Milano 2. The next step was founding the Fininvest company, which laid the foundation for the entire holding.

In the 1980s, he built a media empire and bought the football club AC Milan. He entered politics at the beginning of the next decade.