Theophanous then formed the Labor Renewal Alliance (LRA) with support from Greek, Latin American and Lebanese branches.
Theo Charles Theophanous is a Cypriot Australian who was born on 16 June 1948 in Cyprus and emigrated to Melbourne Australia in 1954.
Theophanous also serves as Shadow Minister for WorkCover, and led the opposition to Kennett government changes.
He introduced the Victorian Renewable Energy Target Scheme[13] and the Basslink Electricity Connection between Victoria and Tasmania[14] during this time.
[17] In December 2008 Theo Theophanous resigned as a Minister in the Brumby Government as a result of impending court proceedings based on an allegation by a woman living in Greece of an incident of rape 10 years earlier.
[8] On 24 July 2009, the charge against him was dismissed after the magistrate ruled that 'the prosecution's case was not sustainable on the evidence at any level" and that it lacked "credibility, reliability and truthfulness".
[18][19] Theophanous subsequently asked the Greek authorities to pursue charges of criminal defamation against the complainant in an Athens court, claiming the woman had concocted the allegation in an attempt to gain financial benefit.
[21] An appeal was filed in October 2010 which was subsequently heard in a superior Athens court, however the original conviction for criminal defamation was upheld albeit with a reduced 2 years sentence.
[22] Theophanous sought an adjudication from the Australian Press Council in relation to articles published in The Age newspaper which he claimed were false and based in part on an undisclosed conflict of interest by Age journalist Carolyn Webb who was a friend of the complainant.
[23] The Australian Press Council upheld the major complaints by Theophanous and their findings were made public on 30 July 2010.
[33] In 2023 Theophanous resigned from the board of the Victorian State Trustees after an Independent Broad-based Corruption Commission investigation found he had behaved improperly in lobbying for a Chinese consortium.