The sight of close to a million voters - most of them women - protesting in the piazzas of Rome and Milan at the weekend was the first credible sign that Italy might finally have had enough of Silvio Berlusconi.

For more than a year the billionaire's personal life - complete with ''bunga bunga'' sex parties and apartment blocks full of nubile starlets - has dominated political debate in Italy.

Silvio Berlusconi is accused of abusing his power. Credit:AP

In any other democracy, a prime minister accused of paying for sex with an under-age nightclub dancer - and abusing his power to get his former dental hygienist to free her from police custody - would either have stepped down to clear his name and spare his government further embarrassment or resigned.

But this is not Berlusconi's modus operandi and now, as the nation digests a Milan judge's decision to put the Prime Minister on trial for child prostitution on April 6, the question arises: why did it take this long? And can anything really change?