Simon Bako Lalong CON (born 5 May 1963) is a Nigerian lawyer and politician, who served as governor of Plateau State from 2015 to 2023 and was appointed Minister of Labour and Employment
Simon Education
He attended elementary and secondary schools in the Shendam Local Government Area before moving on to the S.P.S Keffi, who died in 1986. He then went on to Ahmadu Bello University in Zaria, where he eventually earned a bachelor’s degree in law in 1990. The Lagos Law School, where he was also admitted to the bar, followed this immediately. Later, in 1996, he graduated from the University of Jos with a master’s in law.
Simon Professional life
Between 1992, the year after Lalong graduated from law school, and 1998, the start of Nigeria’s new democracy, he worked as an attorney in the private sector. He employed a number of law firms during this time, one of which he co-owned. He served as the deputy scribe for the Nigerian Bar Association in Plateau State between 1992 and 1994. He returned to the legal profession after serving in politics for seven years, serving as the Principal Partner of Simon B Lalong and Co. until 2015.
Simon political career
Lalong temporarily gave up practicing law in 1998 to focus on a political career. He successfully ran for office in his native Shendam Constituency on behalf of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), and he was elected to the Plateau State House of Assembly. He was elected speaker of the assembly in October 2000, and he held that position until 2006, when the House underwent political turmoil.
He was the longest-serving speaker of the House in Plateau State history thanks to his seven years in office. He was elected as the Chairman of the Conference of Speakers of the 36 states of Nigeria twice during that time (2001 and 2002).
As Jonah Jang’s second term as governor of Plateau State drew to a close in 2015, Lalong entered the race to succeed Jang. This time, he did so in accordance with the political platform of the All Progressive Congress (APC). On May 29, 2015, he took office as the new governor of Plateau State.
Lalong was re-elected as governor of Plateau State on March 9, 2019, and on March 23, 2019, in the Plateau State supplementary gubernatorial election. He received 595,582 votes to General Jeremiah Husseini of the People’s Democratic Party’s (PDP), who received 546,813.
On May 29, 2019, he won reelection to the position of governor of Plateau State. Lalong ran for senate in the 2023 general election to represent the Plateau South senatorial zone in the National Assembly, but Napoleon Bali, who ran on the PDP platform, defeated him. On August 2, 2023, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu nominated Lalong as a minister to represent Plateau State.
