Plateau 2027: Caleb Mutfwang and the Trail of Broken Promises
When then-candidate Caleb Mutfwang sat on the panel of the Rhythm93.7 FM Saturday program,Viewpoint,anchored by seasoned journalist,Samson Omale in Jos ahead of the 2023 gubernatorial polls, he projected the image of a savior. Flanked by other frontline candidates like the APC’s Nentawe Yilwatda,LP Patrick Dakum, Mutfwang spoke with a convincing eloquence that captured the imagination of an electorate desperate for change.
He made lofty promises that resonated deeply with the youth and business community: the immediate completion of the abandoned New Jos Stadium on Zaria Road and a vibrant return of the famous Jos nightlife.
Years into his administration, those grand declarations have aged like fine wine turned to vinegar. The vibrant nightlife remains a shadow of its promised self, choked by lingering anxieties. Meanwhile, the Zaria Road Stadium stands uncompleted, serving as a monumental reminder of campaign-era rhetoric.
Nowhere is this deficit of governance clearer than in the administration’s handling of local sports infrastructure. During a widely publicized media parley, the governor assured journalists that the ongoing renovation of the Rwang Pam Township Stadium would be delivered in time for the Nigeria Premier Football League (NPFL) season. Yet, despite constant inspection tours and official photo-ops, the facility remained trapped in a loop of sluggish development. The delay forced the state’s darling team, Plateau United FC, to continuously shuttle back to the uncompleted Zaria Road facility just to play their games—a frustrating logistical failure for a state that prides itself as a hub of Nigerian football.
Beyond broken infrastructure, the fundamental duty of any government is the protection of lives and property—a mandate where this administration has failed most tragically. Plateau State continues to bleed from lingering insecurity, characterized by brutal attacks, displacement, and systemic human rights infractions.
Most damning is the governor’s inability to secure his very own home territory, Mangu Local Government Area (LGA). If a chief security officer cannot engineer a working security architecture to protect his immediate kinsmen and neighbors in Mangu from recurrent bloodletting, what hope do the rest of Plateau’s vulnerable communities have? This failure on the home front shatters any remaining illusion of structural competence.
Instead of decisive governance, the administration has often resorted to empty political theater. A clear example of this surfaced during his interactive session with Igbo leaders in Jos, where he claimed that the people of Plateau “were deceived” into fighting in the Nigerian Civil War.
Viewed through a critical human rights lens, this post-civil war comment was nothing more than sheer hypocrisy and cheap political gimmicks aimed at pandering to Igbo electorates in Plateau. By deploying revisionist history to score quick political points, the governor not only insulted the memory of Plateau veterans who fought for national unity, but he also cheapened the genuine historical traumas of the civil war for mere electoral optics.
This political posturing masks a starker economic reality: under Governor Mutfwang, the Plateau State economy remains in a state of deep tantrum. Despite the governor’s frequent foreign travels under the guise of attracting global investors, citizens are forced to ask: where are the results? As it stands, there is an absolute drought of new manufacturers or major investors setting up operations in Jos.
Rather than building a resilient economy driven by the state’s vast mineral resources, the administration’s response to a crumbling infrastructure has been reduced to the mere patching of roads. It highlights a severe lack of economic ingenuity to elevate Plateau’s profile, leaving its enormous resource potential largely dormant while fiscal shortfalls widen.
Worse still, instead of generating wealth through creative economic policies, the government has resorted to exploiting its already struggling citizenry. The aggressive deployment of the Vehicle Inspection Office (VIO) on the streets of Jos transformed routine checks into tools of roadside extortion and harassment. This systematic squeezing of commuting citizens recently pushed public frustration past its boiling point, leading to angry residents clashing with and bashing VIO officers on the road.
The severe public backlash and rising tension left the state government with no choice but to forcefully announce the immediate suspension of all VIO operations on the road to avoid a complete breakdown of law and order.
The final straw for many loyal voters came on the political front. Elected on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Governor Mutfwang officially defected to the ruling All Prospects Congress (APC).
To the thousands of citizens who stood in long lines, braved the sun, and cast their ballots specifically for a PDP manifesto, this cross-carpeting is felt as the ultimate betrayal of a sacred democratic mandate. It suggests that personal political survival and alignment take precedence over the collective will of the voters who put him in office.
When you stack unfulfilled campaign promises against the reality of a bloody and neglected Mangu LGA, slow infrastructure, a stagnant economy, citizen exploitation, and a sudden political about-face, the fundamental question must be asked:Should Governor Mutfwang be trusted? As a defender of human,economic rights and public accountability looking ahead toward 2027, the answer is painfully clear.
Trust is earned through protection, economic relief, and fulfilled pledges—not through abandoned stadiums, predatory task forces, and abandoned political platforms.
By Edward E.O
Human Rights Advocate, Global Center for Media & Human Empowerment (GCMHE)
