The occurrence of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAHs) in sediments of River Benue, one of the major rivers in West Africa and the second largest in Nigeria, was investigated in this work. Their sources, ecological and human health risks were also assessed. Sediment samples, collected from six locations along the river, in Makurdi metropolis, were submitted to Soxhlet extraction, cleaned-up and analyzed by gas chromatography/mass spectrometry for 14 USEPA priority PAHs. The concentration of Σ14PAHs in the samples ranged from 55 ± 3 to 382 ± 9 μg⋅kg ⁻¹. Diagnostic ratios indicated pyrogenic and petrogenic as the main sources of PAHs to the river while multivariate analysis using positive matrix factorization indicates that vehicular emission, petrogenic burning, coal combustion and wood combustion may contribute 17%, 35%, 21% and 27% respectively to the total PAHs in the sediments. Hazard quotients for threshold effect concentration (TEC-HQ) were greater than 1 in some samples suggesting rare adverse effects to the benthic wildlife. Probable effect concentrations (PEC-HQ) and their average values (PECqs) were between 0.5 and 1 indicating that slightly adverse effects are probable at a less frequent rate in three sampling points. Potential risks to human health were also noticed since the values for the toxic equivalent quotient (carcinogenic, TEQ) and the mutagenic equivalent quotient (MEQ) were also greater than 1 at various degrees. All results point to a critical scenario, where different anthropogenic sources have contributed to the emergence of persistent pollutants in the River Benue, putting not only the environment at risk but also the exposed population.