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Samuel Ioraer Ortom (; born 23 April 1961) is a Nigerian politician, businessman, administrator and philanthropist. He was a Minister of State Trade and Investments and the Supervising Minister for Aviation in Nigeria during the presidency of Goodluck Jonathan in 2011. Ortom was elected governor of Benue State as a member of the All Progressives Congress in 2015, though he later defected to the People's Democratic Party. He was re-elected as governor on 29 May 2019. Ortom's tenure ended on 29 May 2023, succeeded by a Catholic priest of the opposition party, Hyacinth Alia.
He later obtained the General Certificate of Education as well as the Diploma in Salesmanship. He enrolled at Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria and obtained both the Interim Joint Matriculation Board Certificate, in 1995 and the Diploma in Journalism in 1998. He later attended the Benue State University where he obtained an Advanced Diploma in Personnel Management in 2001 as well as a Master of Public Administration in 2004. Ortom earned a Ph.D., from the Commonwealth University, Belize, through distance learning.
In April 2015, he contested for Governor of Benue State and won, under the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
In July 2018, Ortom announced his departure from All Progressives Congress as a result of an internal party crisis.
In the 9 March 2019 Benue gubernatorial election and 23 March 2019 Benue State supplementary governorship election, Ortom was reelected as Governor having polled 434,473 votes while the runner up Emmanuel Jime of the All Progressive Congress polled 345,155 votes. Following the election, Jime challenged Ortom's victory and filed a petition on the grounds of substantial noncompliance with the provisions of the Electoral Act, 2010 as amended. On 21 January 2020 the Supreme Court affirmed the election of Samuel Ortom as the duly-elected governor of Benue State.
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