| Leonardo Farkas | |
| Birth Name: | Leonardo Julio Farkas Klein |
| Birth Date: | 20 March 1967 |
| Birth Place: | Santiago, Chile |
| Alma Mater: | University of Santiago, Chile |
Leonardo Julio Farkas Klein (Santiago, Chile, born March 20, 1967) is a Chilean businessman and philanthropist of Hungarian and Jewish descent, his wealth comes from mining companies. His philanthropy includes involvement in the Chilean Telethon, and people affected by disasters or in a vulnerable situation.
Farkas's parents were Jews of Hungarian descent who emigrated from Transylvania to South America in 1939.[1]
Farkas studied business administration at the University of Santiago, Chile.
In the 1980s, he emigrated to the United States and worked in show business as a piano player while traveling between Las Vegas, New York, and Miami. He also worked in several Caribbean cruising companies. Known as “The Orchestra Man”, he shared stages with artists such as Tom Jones and Julio Iglesias.[2]
During his performances, he met his wife, an American, Betina Friedman Parker, the great-granddaughter of Arthur Winarick, founder of the Concord Hotel in the Catskills in the state of New York, where they got married.
At the age of 35, he retired from music to focus solely on his wife and their three children, taking on various jobs as an exporter and seller of various products. He also entered the real estate business in the United States, and then mining business in Chile.[3] [4]
In October 2008 Farkas announced that he was considering being an independent candidate for the presidential election of 2009.[5] [6] However, on December 5, he announced he would not be running.[7] In the polls of the last 3 presidential elections in Chile, he has been mentioned among the top preferences but has never accepted to run. Between 2019 and 2020, Farkas's preferences increased in the polls.[8] In July 2020, Farkas polled in second place for Chilean presidency.[9]
In 2021, the international news company Bloomberg chose Leonardo Farkas among the 500 most influential Latin Americans. The agency stated that the mining entrepreneur is retired but "remains a relevant figure in local business and politics. More than anything, a philanthropist, Farkas has become a success story that, through social networks, promotes a successful platform to help thousands of Chileans in poverty situations."[10] [11]
Farkas appears in the Teletón (Chilean telethon), a fundraising campaign for handicapped children. Farkas donated hundreds of millions of pesos, and in 2008, donated 1 billion pesos (approx. US$2 million), becoming the first individual to donate such amount of money to this campaign.[12] Farkas has been very critical of the Chilean upper class, stating that "they’re usually very stingy and elitist" and don't do enough to mitigate Chile's social problems. He has also said that if elected president "all Chileans would have their own house".[13] This rhetoric of appealing to the masses of poor people has gained him substantial support among that social group and some harsh criticism from his business peers and local politicians, often labeling him as a "populist" in search of some spotlight.[13]
During the rescue operation in Copiapó, Chile of the trapped miners, Farkas donated $10,000 to each of the 33 rescued men. Farkas reportedly gave checks in the miners' names to each of the families and set up a separate fund to collect donations.[14] On July 1, 2011, Farkas was given an award by the Viña del Mar Mayor for his contributions to the city. [15]
On February 7, 2018, Farkas offered a reward of 10 million Chilean pesos for anyone who found Emmelyn Catalina Cañales Vidal, an 11-year-old girl who was kidnapped in Licantén, Chile.[16]
Farkas is a patron of the March of the Living, an annual educational program which brings students to Poland, to study the history of the Holocaust and examine the roots of prejudice, intolerance and hate.[17]
According to a study, coordinated by Magdalena Aninat, director of the Centro de Filantropía e Inversiones Sociales (Cefis) of the Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez (UAI), which investigated the philanthropy and social investments of Chilean companies, concluded that "Farkas is an actor that it is pushing others and acting as a 'role of conscience.' It has a very interesting role to make visible a more American model of the success of the business world, where that success closes with returning the hand to society. In Chile we are not used to making donations visible, but Farkas is constantly challenging the business world to be present and that is positive," said the UAI academic.[18]
In 2014, with the support of Leonardo Farkas, March of the Living marked the 70th anniversary of the destruction of Hungarian Jewry at the hands of the Nazis in 1944 during World War II. On Holocaust Remembrance Day, at the close of the memorial ceremony on the grounds of Auschwitz-Birkenau, a number of Holocaust survivors – many whose relatives perished in the death camp – joined Leonardo Farkas in the writing of the last letters of a Torah. The Torah was donated to the March of the Living by Mr. Farkas.[19]
In 2014, Leonardo donated the seven newly written Sefer Torah sent to six different continents: Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, North America and South America. Over the years, Farkas has donated Sefer Torahs to the Chabad-Lubavitch hassidic Jewish organization and other institutions around the world.[20]