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14. 12. 09. - 15:00

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14. 12. 09. - 15:00

Caritas President Franz Küberl named 'Man of the Year'

By David Rogers

Catholic charity Caritas President Franz Küberl has been named business magazine trend’s "Man of the Year" for 2009.

Catholic news agency Kathpress reported today (Mon) trend had honoured Küberl for his 15 years as head of the organisation as of 2010 and his ability to communicate well even in discussions of controversial topics.

Market researcher Helene Karmasin said: "A brand like Caritas needs a perfect representative, and Franz Küberl is exactly the right person."

She added that he was in effect an attorney for everyone who had fallen into poverty.

Kathpress said trend had claimed that Küberl had developed Caritas into a large and effective service provider and that its nine diocesan organisations had a budget of around half a billion Euros.

Born in 1953 in Styria, Küberl is the first layman to serve as president of Caritas. He became diocesan secretary of the Styrian Catholic youth organisation in 1972 after working as an administrative official at Graz provincial hospital.

He became secretary of the national Catholic youth organisation in 1976 and head of the federal youth organisation in 1978. That position enabled him to make widespread contacts throughout the country.

Küberl became head of Styrian Caritas in 1994 and Caritas Austria one year later.

One of his recent initiatives was a new Electricity Assistance Fund to help needy Austrians in cooperation with electricity-provider Verbund.

Another Caritas initiative was the lighting of thousands of candles last month on the main squares of the cities of Vienna, Graz and Klagenfurt as well as in Styrian towns Murau and Kapfenberg to raise awareness of poverty and social inequality.

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