The 2023 Niger State gubernatorial election will take place on 18 March 2023, to elect the Governor of Niger State, concurrent with elections to the Niger 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 Abubakar Sani Bello 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 Congress nominating Mohammed Umar Bago—House of Representatives member for Chanchaga—on 26 May while the Peoples Democratic Party nominated former commissioner Isah Liman Kantigi on the same day after its primary was postponed by 24 hours.^[4][5]

The governor of Niger 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.

Niger State is a large, diverse state in the North Central with agricultural and energy potential but facing a debilitated health sector and intense challenges in security as the nationwide kidnapping epidemic, bandit conflict, and herder–farmer clashes have all heavily affected the state with added fears of ISWAP encroachment.^[6][7]

Politically, the state's 2019 elections were a solidification of the control of the state APC. In federal elections, Buhari retained the state presidentially while the APC swept all three senate seats and ten House of Representatives seats. On the state level, the party also held the governorship and kept the majority in the House of Assembly.

Ahead of his second term, Bello pledged to focus on education, increasing agricultural production, affordable housing, and improving access to clean drinking water.^[8] In terms of his performance, Bello was praised for expanding the energy sector but was criticized for failing to combat rising insecurity, poor road infrastructure, a failure to pay teacher salaries and the ensuing educator strike, having a political opponent imprisoned, and his role in the March 2022 APC leadership crisis.^{[9][10][11][12]}

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][13] An informal zoning gentlemen's agreement sets the Niger South Senatorial District to produce the next governor as someone from Niger South has not held the governorship since 2007. While only the PDP has closed their primaries to non-Southern candidates, nearly all potential candidates are from the South and it appears as if both major parties are holding to the zoning agreement.^[14]

After the primaries, the major party nominees—mostly Bago (APC)—spent months attempting to reconcile with aggrieved members of their own parties. Bago went on a reconciliatory tour around the state to meet party members; these APC reconciliation attempts occurred all while the PDP conversely tried to woo aggrieved APC members into the party. Analysts questioned the effectiveness of Bago's tour, especially amid other disputes within the state APC.^[44] In early 2023, campaign analysis focused on the divides between urban-rural electorates with reports stating that Bago led in his native city of Minna while Kantigi led in Nupe-majority rural communities of the state's south.^[45] But the campaign was derailed by controversy in mid-February, when a video surfaced showing Kantigi issuing death threats against voters who planned to take his bribes but not eventually vote for him.^[46] Later in February, attention largely switched to the presidential election on 25 February. In the election, Niger State voted for Bola Tinubu (APC); Tinubu won 48.2% of the vote, beating the 36.6% of Atiku Abubakar (PDP) and the 10.3% of Peter Obi (LP). In the wake of the result, the EiE-SBM forecast projected Bago to win.^[47]

• 2023 Nigerian elections
• 2023 Nigerian gubernatorial elections