Voivode

It primarily referred to the medieval rulers of the Romanian-inhabited states and of governors and military commanders of Poles, Hungarian, Lithuanian Balkan, Russian people and other Slavic-speaking populations.

The title voevodas (Greek: βοεβόδας) originally occurs in the work of the 10th-century Byzantine emperor Constantine VII in his De Administrando Imperio, in reference to Hungarian military leaders.

[3][4] The title was used in medieval: Bohemia, Bosnia, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Hungary, Macedonia, Moldavia, Poland, Rügen, Russian Empire, Ukraine, Serbia, Transylvania and Wallachia.

[5][3] In the Late Middle Ages the voivode, Latin translation is comes palatinus for the principal commander of a military force, deputising for the monarch gradually became the title of territorial governors in Poland, Hungary and the Czech lands and in the Balkans.

The transition of the voivode from military leader to a high ranking civic role in territorial administration (Local government) occurred in most Slavic-speaking countries and in the Balkans during the Late Middle Ages.

[14] In some provinces and vassal states of the Ottoman Empire, the title of voivode (or voyvoda) was employed by senior administrators and local rulers.

This was common to the extent in Ottoman Bosnia,[17][18] but especially in the Danubian Principalities, which protected the northern borders of the empire and were ruled by the Greek Phanariotes.

[21] One such holder of this title, Hadji Ali Haseki, was voivode on five separate occasions before his final banishment and execution in 1795 after angering both the Greek and Turkish residents of Athens and making powerful enemies at the Porte.

His military functions were entirely reduced to supervising a mass mobilization and in practice he ended up as little more than overseer of weights and measures.

The exceptions were the voivodes of Polock and Vitebsk who were elected by a local poll of male electors for confirmation by the monarch.

[23] Polish voivodes were subject to the Law of Incompatibility (1569) which prevented them from simultaneously holding ministerial or other civic offices in their area.

Their culmination was the regulation of the President of Poland, Ignacy Mościcki, of 1928, on the organization and scope of operation of general administration authorities.

[26] Confidential resolutions of the Council of Ministers issued on 6, 9, and 18 August 1923 established a catalogue of means of influence for the voivodes in relation to all non-combined branches.

It granted the voivode special supervisory and intervention powers in relation to non-combined administration (Polish: Administracja niezespolona).

It could convene meetings of heads of non-combined administration bodies for the purpose of coordination their work from the point of view of the interests of the state, demand explanations from them in specific matters and suspend the enforcement of orders contrary to government policy, could also interfere in personnel matters of non-combined administration bodies.

In the thirties, the voivode was responsible for the implementation of the goals and policies of the Sanation camp, hence this position was held by people belonging to the most loyal members of the ruling political group.

The provincial department (Polish: Wydział wojewódzki), introduced for the first time in Poland, was the executive body of the Voivodeship National Council.

In according to statue of 20 March 1950, the institution of the Voivode was abolished and his competences was transferred to the Voivodeship National Council and it's presidium.

[33] Since the publishing of the law amending the Act on National Councils of 1973, departments and other organizational units previously subordinated directly to the Presidium of National Councils were transformed into a comprehensively recognized office (Polish: urząd) with the help of which the voivode was to perform his tasks as state administration body.

The voivode, on the basis of the guidelines of the council of ministers, also prepared draft plans for the socio-economic development of the voivodeship and draft budgets, implemented the plan and budget adopted by the voivodeship national council and performed other tasks related to the comprehensive development of the voivodeship and meeting the needs of society, focusing on key problems, especially concerning the complex of agriculture and food economy, improving market supply, housing construction and housing management, as well as meeting the communal and living needs of the population.

Also, the establishment of new bodies - financial supervision in the form of the Regional Chamber of Accounts and the Adjudication Committee and Boards of Appeals changed the scope of competences of voivodes.

The Small Constitution of 1992 did not assign any special tasks to the voivodes in the field of taking care of the development of the voivodeship or the development of its resources, because already then it was realized that the administrative division into 49 administrative units does not meet the requirements of the time and that the voivode is in fact not the host of region, but a representative of the Council of Ministers and, on its behalf, the Prime Minister.

The voivode could also, in particularly justified cases, suspend the activities of each body conducting administrative enforcement for a specified period of time.

The voivode, at the request of the staroste, with the opinion of the competent head of the combined service, inspection or voivodeship guard, could create, transform and liquidate organizational units constituting the auxiliary apparatus of the heads of powiat services, inspections and guards, unless separate provisions provided otherwise.

After the Second World War, the newly formed Yugoslav People's Army stopped using the royal ranking system, making the name obsolete.