Pantami Clinches PDP Gombe Ticket in Court-Ordered Rerun

Former Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Professor Isa Ali Ibrahim Pantami, has emerged as the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) governorship candidate for Gombe State in the 2027 general elections after winning a court-ordered fresh primary election.

The direct primary, conducted on Tuesday across all 114 wards in the state’s 11 local government areas, saw Pantami secure a decisive victory with 2,054 votes. He defeated former House of Representatives member Khamisu Ahmed Mailantarki, who polled 389 votes, and Hon. Usman Aliyu Garry, who scored 112 votes. A total of 2,555 party members were accredited for the exercise.

Announcing the results at the PDP state secretariat in Gombe, the Chairman of the Governorship Primary Election Committee, Hon. Johnbull Tiemlong Shekarau, declared Pantami the winner and the party’s duly elected candidate for the 2027 polls.

The fresh primary followed a September 24 ruling by Justice Amina Aliyu Mohammed of the Federal High Court in Gombe. The court nullified Pantami’s earlier emergence as the PDP candidate, which had come through a voice affirmation process in May 2026, and ordered the party to conduct a new primary within 30 days in line with its guidelines and relevant electoral laws. The suit was filed by aspirants including Mailantarki and Garry, who challenged the validity of the initial process.

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Pantami, a renowned Islamic scholar, had defected to the PDP after withdrawing from the All Progressives Congress (APC) governorship race. The APC had settled on Jamilu Gwamna as its consensus candidate. In his acceptance remarks, Pantami thanked party members for the peaceful conduct of the election and called on his fellow aspirants to join forces for the success of all PDP candidates in the general elections. He pledged to deliver purposeful leadership focused on poverty reduction, youth empowerment, agriculture, industrialisation and human capital development if elected in 2027.

The development sets the stage for a keenly contested governorship race in Gombe State, with Pantami now positioned as the PDP flagbearer against the APC’s candidate.