Barely 24 hours to the publication of the names of governorship and State Assembly candidates by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC) risks failing to field a governorship candidate in Plateau State.

The development follows a dispute over the party’s governorship ticket, after the NDC reportedly submitted the name of its state chairman, Yakubu Ndam, as a placeholder following the purported suspension of Da Jonathan Sunday Akuns, who emerged unopposed from the party’s direct primary election in the state.

Amid the uncertainty, the party’s North Central National Vice Chairman, Engineer Barnabas Ejisi, and Ndam have reportedly been making efforts to secure a substantive replacement for the placeholder.

As stakeholders became aware of the dispute over the governorship ticket, NDC leaders reportedly approached the party’s vice-presidential candidate, Senator Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, in an attempt to resolve the contest between Akuns and those seeking to replace him.

In a telephone interview, Ndam told The Guardian that his nomination as a placeholder was intended to give stakeholders time to agree on a consensus candidate. He, however, said he did not recognise the claim that the ticket was under contention.

Those seeking to replace Akuns, who hails from Plateau Central Senatorial District, reportedly encountered another hurdle after discovering that the state’s zoning arrangement did not favour Ndam’s emergence as the substantive governorship candidate.

Led by Ejisi, the stakeholders reportedly reached out to former governor Jonah Jang to explore the possibility of moving Jang’s preferred candidate in the Kabiru Tanimu Turaki faction of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Garba Sunday Biggs, to the NDC as a replacement for the placeholder.

However, when Kwankwaso visited Jang at his Abuja residence penultimate weekend to felicitate him on his 80th birthday, Jang reportedly rejected the proposal to move his preferred candidate to the NDC.

It was gathered that, in anticipation of a favourable outcome from his meeting with Jang, Kwankwaso had directed the Kano State governorship candidate of the party, Comrade Aminu Gwarzo, to meet members of the Plateau State Kwankwasiyya Movement in preparation for mobilising support for Biggs as the NDC’s governorship candidate in Plateau State.

A close ally of the former governor told The Guardian that Jang recalled Kwankwaso’s alleged failure to support him during the contest for the chairmanship of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF), an election in which Rotimi Amaechi defeated Jang by 18 votes to 15 during the administration of former President Goodluck Jonathan.

Checks by The Guardian revealed that the Plateau governorship crisis is among the cases being considered by the Northern Zonal Reconciliation Sub-Committee set up by the NDC to address complaints and disputes arising from the party’s primary elections and state structures in the region.

With INEC expected to publish the list of governorship candidates for the 19 political parties participating in the 2027 general election on Saturday, it remains to be seen whether the NDC will field a candidate in Plateau State or leave the incumbent governor, Caleb Mutfwang of the All Progressives Congress (APC), facing a potentially less competitive re-election contest.