NGScorecard

Promised to build on the relative calm of his early tenure and durably end the cycle of intercommunal farmer-herder violence that has recurred across Plateau's southern local governments.

Relative peace in the administration's first years was shattered by a June 2018 coordinated attack on villages in Barkin Ladi and Riyom that killed between 86 (police-confirmed) and over 150 (community estimates) people, and renewed Irigwe-Fulani clashes in Bassa LGA killed at least 100 more between January and August 2021. The underlying conflict was never durably resolved during his eight-year tenure.

Promised to reverse what his administration characterised as unjust mass teacher dismissals under the previous government and rebuild the state's teaching workforce.

The administration recalled over 2,000 teachers sacked under the Jang government and separately recruited and retrained 4,800 primary school teachers, alongside constructing 639 primary and junior secondary school classrooms.

Promised to invest in tertiary education infrastructure, including the state's own university.

The administration secured accreditation for 17 courses at Plateau State University, Bokkos, established faculties of Health Sciences, Environmental Science, Law, and Agriculture, and allocated ₦500 million toward the university's infrastructural development.

Promised to clear the roughly eight months of salary arrears and twelve months of pension arrears inherited at handover, and to keep workers paid promptly going forward.

Lalong's administration says it settled the inherited arrears and did not default on salary or pension payments through to its final months in office, a claim publicly reiterated by the Governor as a signature commitment fulfilled.

Sought re-election in the March 2019 governorship poll.

Lalong won the 9 March 2019 election with 595,582 votes over PDP's Jeremiah Useni. Useni's petition alleging Lalong presented a fraudulent certificate was dismissed by the Tribunal, the Court of Appeal, and finally the Supreme Court.

Promised prudent fiscal management to bring down the roughly ₦222 billion debt inherited from the Jang administration in 2015.

Lalong's supporters say the administration never defaulted on debt service and handed over a verified debt stock of about ₦201.2 billion as of April 2023. His successor, Governor Caleb Mutfwang, disputed this and said his administration inherited ₦307 billion — a gap the two camps have never publicly reconciled.

Committed to delivering a set of flagship 'legacy projects' valued at roughly ₦50 billion as signature achievements of the administration.

A coalition of civil society groups said in May 2024 that the ₦50 billion legacy projects were abandoned unfinished and remained the subject of litigation with the contractors involved, and called on the EFCC to investigate.

Implicit obligation to properly remit taxes deducted from civil servants' salaries to the appropriate revenue authorities.

The same May 2024 civil society petition alleged that roughly ₦17 billion deducted from civil servants' salaries as Pay-As-You-Earn (PAYE) tax between 2015 and 2023 could not be accounted for, and asked the EFCC to investigate.

Implicit commitment to oversee local government administration transparently and hold council officials accountable for public funds.

During Lalong's second term, the Plateau State 9th House of Assembly suspended 17 local government chairmen over allegations of financial misappropriation — a scale of local-government accountability breakdown that civil society groups later cited as grounds for a broader EFCC probe of the administration.