Kazan, Russia -- Rustam Minnikhanov, the leader of Russia's autonomous republic of Tatarstan, has signed into law a bill on constitutional amendments, including a change that abolishes the title of the republic’s president.
According to the amendments that Minnikhanov endorsed on January 26 just hours after Tatarstan's lawmakers approved them in all three readings, the title of Tatarstan's leader as of February 6 will be "glava" (head) in Russian and "rais" in Tatar, which still translates as president or chairman. Leaders of several Arab nations are officially called rais.
When lawmakers in December gave initial approval of the move following a directive from Moscow, they said that under transition arrangements, Minnikhanov would be allowed to complete his current term as president, which runs until 2025.
The change was prompted by legislation proposed by Russian federal lawmakers and signed into force by President Vladimir Putin last year that provides for replacing the title of president of autonomous republics with the more generic title of head.
Minnikhanov was the last regional leader in Russia to use the title of president since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991.
All of the Russian Federation's other ethnic republics have already changed the titles of their leaders from president to head, while regional parliaments have lost their independence in adopting laws and regulations.
In October 2021, Tatarstan's parliament first voted to reject the Russian lawmakers' bill on the grounds that it would violate the autonomous republic's constitution.
But in December 2022, Minnikhanov told lawmakers that he favored the change, arguing that opposing it would undermine the unity of the Russian Federation at a time when Moscow is involved in a war with Ukraine.