RSL Tasmania has instead selected former governor William Cox to speak at the Kingston and Hobart services.

Political veterans on Friday said it was unusual not to have the Governor of Tasmania speak on Anzac Day.

However, RSL Tasmania president Robert Dick said it was not compulsory to have a governor speak at the Anzac Day service.

Mr Dick said the former governor was asked because his father won a Military Cross on the Western Front in World War I.

‘‘We discussed this with the Governor about six weeks ago and explained about it being the centenary and why we had Bill Cox,’’ Mr Dick said.

‘‘She had no problems with it at all.’’

Professor Warner is the state’s first female governor and will attend the Hobart dawn service and take the salute for the 10am Hobart parade.

She will also lay a wreath at 11.45am and attend a dedication service for the Flame of Remembrance at the Hobart Cenotaph and officiate at the unveiling of the Northern VC Memorial.

Mr Cox on Friday said his speech would not address any points raised in a controversial Anzac Day speech by the late governor Peter Underwood at the Hobart cenotaph last year.

As a result of his speech, a motion to ban Mr Underwood from speaking at any cenotaph was moved at the 2014 state RSL congress.

Mr Dick said the motion was shot down unanimously by voters.

‘‘To try and put a gag on someone like that is totally undemocratic,’’ he said.

‘‘We live in a free country and he was totally entitled to express his opinion – that’s what the Anzacs fought for.’’

During his speech Mr Underwood said Australia needed to ‘‘drop the sentimental myths that Anzac Day has attracted’’.

‘‘We should spend less time studying Simpson’s donkey and more time looking at why we were fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan for so long,’’ Mr Underwood said.