Reportedly praise soldiers protecting former PM and civic dignitary (4,5)
I believe the answer is:
lord mayor
'civic dignitary' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'reportedly praise soldiers protecting former pm' is the wordplay.
I cannot really see how this works, but
'soldiers' could be 'or' (Other Ranks) and 'or' is found within the answer.
'pm' could be 'may' (former UK prime minister Theresa May) and 'may' is found in the answer.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).
'and' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for lord mayor that I've seen before include "Title of first citizen of a city" , "Municipal official" , "Civic dignitary" , "head for city" , "city position" .)