Maria Svolou, a Greek feminist and socialist leader

Maria Svolou (1892 – 1976) was a Greek feminist and socialist leader.

As secretary of the League for Women's Rights she advocated for the creation of night schools for women who worked and fought against prostitution. She campaigned and wrote on behalf of equality for the women of Greece and was also an inspector of labor for the Ministry of Economics.

There, she used her position there to draw attention the poor working and housing conditions of impoverished working women.

Svolou was involved in liberal politics from 1911 to 1936 and supported the peace movement. She was editor of the magazine Woman's Struggle and was exiled from Greece from 1936 to 1940 with her husband by dictator Ioannis Metaxas.

She was a leader of the liberal feminist movement but believed that gender equality could only be attained after fundamental societal change.

Svolou returned to Greece in 1940 and volunteered in the Greco-Italian War as a nurse. Later, she organised meals with the Red Cross for children during the German occupation of Greece.

Svolou joined the EAM-ELAS resistance movement and was elected a member of the National Council, while her husband became chairman of the EAM-led Political Committee of National Liberation. She sympathised with the Communists and was exiled again in 1948, during the Greek Civil War.

Following her return she ran for the Parliament as a member of the United Democratic Left. She was elected twice and was a member of the party's Central Committee.

Dean Kalimniou is a lawyer, author and heavily involved in the Greek-Australian community.