The 2023 Ebonyi State gubernatorial election will take place on 18 March 2023, to elect the Governor of Ebonyi State, concurrent with elections to the Ebonyi State House of Assembly as well as twenty-seven other gubernatorial elections and elections to all other state houses of assembly.^[1][2] The election—which was postponed from its original 11 March date—will be held three weeks after the presidential election and National Assembly elections.^[3] Incumbent APC Governor Dave Umahi is term-limited and cannot seek re-election to a third term.

Party primaries were scheduled for between 4 April and 9 June 2022 with the All Progressives Grand Alliance nominating former Secretary to the State Government Bernard Odoh on 29 May while both the All Progressives Congress and the Peoples Democratic Party had two separate parallel primaries.^[4] For the APC, one primary nominated Speaker of the House of Assembly Francis Nwifuru on 26 May while another was won by former Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission chairman Elias Mbam on the same day;^[5][6][7] in the PDP, one primary nominated businessman Ifeanyi Odii on 30 May as a different primary nominated Senator for Ebonyi Central Joseph Ogba on 6 June.^[8][9] By July, INEC recognised Nwifuru as the APC nominee while the PDP nomination was awarded to Odii by the Supreme Court in September.^[10][11]

The Governor of Ebonyi State is elected using a modified two-round system. To be elected in the first round, a candidate must receive the plurality of the vote and over 25% of the vote in at least two-thirds of state local government areas. If no candidate passes this threshold, a second round will be held between the top candidate and the next candidate to have received a plurality of votes in the highest number of local government areas.

Ebonyi State is a small, Igbo-majority southeastern state with a growing economy and vast natural areas but facing an underdeveloped yet vital agricultural sector, rising debt, and a low COVID-19 vaccination rate.

Politically, the state's 2019 elections were categorized as a continuation of the PDP's control as Umahi won with over 81% of the vote and the party won every seat in the House of Assembly along with all three senate seats. However, the PDP did lose one House of Representatives seat to the APC after a court ruling and although the state was easily won by PDP presidential nominee Atiku Abubakar, it still swung towards Buhari compared to 2015 and had lower turnout. In the interim between 2019 and 2023, the state's political landscape drastically changed as Umahi defecting to the APC in November 2020 set in motion a wave of other defections that gave the APC control of the House of Assembly. While the defections massively improved the APC's southeastern standing, the legal ramifications are still unknown as a high court briefly removed Umahi and all assemblymembers who also defected from office in March 2022 until the decision was overturned on appeal; it has been appealed further.

Ahead of his second term, Umahi stated focuses included agriculture, economic development, and resource development; however, he was criticized for authoritarian-esque actions. Alarms were raised after Umahi's defection when he ordered security forces to lock the state PDP secretariat in 2021 and when the state PDP spokesman was arrested for criticizing Umahi in 2022; he was also accused of using security forces to harass critics and political opponents.^{[12][13][14][15][16]} At other points during his administration, Umahi was given praise for economic diversification and increasing government transparency while receiving further criticism for blaming IPOB attacks on politicians without evidence and ranting against the judiciary.^{[17][18][19][20]}

The primaries, along with any potential challenges to primary results, were to take place between 4 April and 3 June 2022 but the deadline was extended to 9 June.^[2][21] An informal zoning gentlemen's agreement sets the Ebonyi North Senatorial District to have the next governor as Ebonyi North has not held the governorship since 2007.^[22] However, some groups such as the Association of Ebonyi State Indigenes in the Diaspora claimed that as one full rotation of districts would be complete in 2023, further zoning was unnecessary.^[23][24][25] On the other hand, some leaders in the Izzi subgroup of the Igbo people claim that not only should the governorship be zoned to Ebonyi North, it should go to the Izzi as former Governor Sam Egwu was from a non-Izzi area of Ebonyi North. Meanwhile, some leaders in the Ezaa subgroup of the Igbo people called for their group to hold the governorship as the Ezaa are one of the largest subgroups in the state.^[26]

Eventually, the PDP settled on zoning to the "Abakaliki bloc" (the North and Central Senatorial Districts) while APGA and the APC declined to formally zone their nominations.^[27]

Much of the general election campaign was dominated by internal party disputes that often led to extensive legal battles. The nominations of both Nwifuru and Odii were challenged by the winners of their parties' parallel primaries with the PDP case rising to the Supreme Court.^[11] For the state PDP, the court cases were only a part of its wider internal crisis.^[79] By 2023, attention mainly switched to the presidential election on 25 February. In the election, Ebonyi State voted for Peter Obi (LP); Obi won the state with 79.8% of the vote, beating Bola Tinubu (APC) at 13.0% and Atiku Abubakar (PDP) at 4.2%. Although the result was unsurprising—Ebonyi is in Obi's southeastern stronghold and projections had favored him—the result led to increased attention on the chances of LP gubernatorial nominee Edward Nkwegu as opposed to Nwifuru, Odoh, or Odii. However, the LP nomination itself was embroiled in legal action which culminated in the removal of Nkwegu as nominee. In the wake of the presidential election and the court ruling sacking Nkwegu, analysts focused on various factors including regional strength by candidate, internal party relations, and zoning dynamics.^[80][81]

• 2023 Nigerian elections
• 2023 Nigerian gubernatorial elections