Daily Times

Italy’s “family-first” prime minister Giorgia Meloni has broken up with her TV journalist boyfriend after lewd comments against a co-host led to the suspension of his television show.

Meloni took to social media Friday to announce the split from Andrea Giambruno who is also the father of their 7-year-old daughter.

“My relationship with Andrea Giambruno, which lasted almost ten years, ends here,” Meloni wrote just two days after video of his lewd behaviour during a commercial break of the popular Striscia la Notizia program on Mediaset went viral.

“I thank him for the splendid years we spent together, for the difficulties we went through, and for giving me the most important thing in my life, which is our daughter Ginevra.” Giambruno said through his agent Friday that he and Mediaset had “agreed” that his show would be suspended in the aftermath of the scandal.

He was not in the anchor chair during the Friday afternoon show taping. Mediaset told CNN affiliate SKY24 that they were “investigating the facts” surrounding Giambruno’s alleged behaviour. In the video, which was shot during a commercial break in front of a live audience, and posted on the program’s social media accounts and website.

Giambruno is seen walking around the set and heard asking a female co-host if she has a boyfriend, which she says she does and that he had asked her earlier. Mediaset, which was owned by the late politician Silvio Berlusconi, has long been criticised for airing objectionable content and often publishes behind-the-scenes videos of their popular program.

In Meloni’s social media post, she wrote: “Our paths have diverged for some time, and the time has come to acknowledge it. I will defend what we were, I will defend our friendship, and I will defend, at all costs, a seven-year-old girl who loves her mother and loves her father, as I was unable to love mine.”