The Many Killers Of Osinachi Nwachukwu (The Nigerian Gospel Artist) By Austin Isikhuemen

I hate to write about death. The terrestrial finality of cessation of life, which humans like to elegantly call transition, is so surreal. And painful. But man is also full of conceit. Only human deaths are called transition but when we derisively call lower animals to die, we just say they died.

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You see, those ones do not transit. But has someone asked them? That’s a debate for another day and forum. There are more serious issues in the polity today.

Two times in the last three years I have had to mourn the deaths of very close friends and family members. I lost the great Okpokhenlen in 2019 – my natal vessel of whom my community and we siblings are still very proud. Next, I lost Idowu Neilis Aideh to the cold hands of covid19 – his great dreams for a greater future evaporated. Just like that.

Then I lost a rare gem, a sartorial enthusiast, a national and Esan treasure, a treasure trove of security knowledge, an altruistic and gregarious contributor to the national security discourse, and a quintessential family man. High Chief Sir Dr. Ona Ekhomu of blessed memory. He left a void that I am yet to see filled.

The grief I felt is still there, but the achievements of these giants is consoling somewhat. But I feel so because I knew these departed souls intimately, benefited from their large hearts, shared good times and we were family and friends. In fact, I could argue that my profound mourning of them is a bounden duty, a moral obligation.

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But this death, no – this killing, of the gospel nightingale, the godly songstress, whose voice can make even the cripple want to dance, Osinachi Nwachukwu, belongs to a different genre of transition. And the pain is different. And real.

I never met her, or seen her play live except on TV and social media nor do I know her beyond her songs that edify and elevate the spirit. Even professed atheists like Dr. Tai Solarin would have loved to attend church service solely for her song’s renditions.

Only God knows how many people have had their hard hearts softened through listening to her songs or converted to the ways of Christ because of her choir ministrations as Pentecostals like to call it. Winning souls was her fort.

When you see her dress, you tell yourself this is a virtuous woman. Moderate without looking mundane, elegance in simplicity. Not for her the partial exposure of mammary appurtenances that the woke brigade calls cleavage.

You would think a man in her church audience who has the privilege to call her his spouse would be full of immense pride when she takes the microphone and starts to belch out one melodious tune after another. Such mesmerized audiences always gawk in awe of the talent nature has endowed her with and which she has carefully and painstakingly groomed to the zenith.

But for her choice of the straight and narrow path of righteousness and ministration in God’s vineyard, Osinachi would have given Davido, Burna and Wizkid stiff competition.

Even on music award podia around the world. If you doubt this just listen to her Ekwueme rendition. That song is a national anthem of sorts in churches across Africa.

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They said she died of domestic violence. Such elegant language to describe an atrocious, bestial, terroristic dispatch to the beyond by someone she loved who ought to love her! Oh no… she was not killed by domestic violence.

Domestic violence has no gender, doesn’t malevolently head a wife like a football on the chest, and doesn’t have children watch their mother being hit viciously on the head with a pressing iron!

Where was he when Mutiu Adepoju was heading balls and scoring goals for Nigeria and in the European league, making millions as a result? That wasn’t Mr. Domestic Violence I saw on social media playing giant Putin on his vulnerable, helpless spouse. That was Mr. Evil unleashed, doing at home what he can never attempt with his mates outside. A coward of the worst kind!

Can anyone who knows that beast and can, or is still willing to, reach him in incarceration please tell him (‘it’ really, as beasts are wont to be addressed) that that woman he murdered (allegedly as the law requires us to say) was more than his wife? She was a national treasure and a role model to a lot of young girls and womenfolk.

With such a demonstrated mindset and bestial character and deportment, he is not even capable of seeing beyond his jealousy of his partner’s success. Otherwise, I would have asked that he imagine the void he has created by his dastardly and gruesome ‘achievement’.

Such beasts have no imagination anyway, beyond that which makes them jealous because the rest of the world loves their artiste spouse. Such a monumental caveman instinct!

Do we need any crystal ball to tell us that this man has fed fat on the accruable benefits from Osinachi’s stardom? And instead of supporting her to win more bread, the supposed breadwinner may have been resenting a role reversal while feeding fat on the poor woman’s sweat. Such ingratitude. Such a violent efulefu. Check Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart for efulefu definition.

Before we all begin to cast the first stone, let Nigerian men stop and think. About the Osinachi we kill our women daily across the land. Yes, I put it that bluntly because we need to face the facts. A lot of beating, maltreatment, destiny roadblock erection, silent violence where the woman is treated as furniture, violation of rights, and killing (oh yes!) take place in our polity but go unreported.

Osinachi’s case made headlines for two reasons – she is a celebrity and she died. Who has not heard of some men preventing their wives from going for further studies either because they cannot do so themselves or they feel the woman will upstage them?

Are there no men today who take their spouses’ salaries to beer parlors and football betting joints and yet expect sumptuous dinner at home every evening? Some are unsupportive of their wives’ ambition in any endeavor. And there are some who use religion or culture to justify this – when all else fails, those are what men resort to.

The Senate vote to deny women affirmative action and also reject the proposed reservation of special seats for women in political parties is another way of killing Osinachi!

It is a crying shame and a sign of living in the stone age if we continue to deny our women folk who form 49.2% of our population and suffer so much deprivation to bring us, men, up and put food on tables their due recognition and place in our polity.

Didn’t an honorable member of our national parliament drag his four Osinachi’s to the hallowed chambers as proof of his capacity and capability? Osinachization of our womenfolk must stop. Loving your wife is healthier than going to the gym after being an ogre at home.

Same goes for a government that reduces the number of women in the cabinet and headship of MDAs from the peak we reached under a previous administration. Even the universities hardly allow women to rise to VCship except for the great Uniben which has been blessed with two great female Vice Chancellors and their tenures have been eras of progress.

There are some of my male readers who as men would feel I have been too hard on men and that I should keep our secrets secret. Others who suffer violence from their wives would retort that I don’t know what I am talking about.

They both have their points, and this is a democracy. But I would answer them this way: Let them also write, argue their cases, and have the courage to say they wish their daughters the Osinachi fate. That is the gauntlet I throw down herewith.

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Lastly, not all women have earned the right of indignation some of them are expressing in the Osinachi case. I have a firsthand experience of mothers-in-law of who were supportive of their son’s violence toward their wives.

Incidentally, one of their couples got their groove back after the mother-in-law kicked the bucket and it has been lovey-dovey ever since. The other is today at peace with themselves because the mother of the man has lost the hold she had on him and the blinkers have dropped from the man’s eyes.

So, there is work to do to make Osinachi to rest in peace. That work requires both that both men and women collectively say ‘never again’ and do the handwork required to achieve it.

The police should never turn back a woman, or man for that matter, being molested at home on the grounds that it is just a family matter. Let them tell us which part of the law so stipulates.

Anyone hearing yelling and fisticuffs by a man and wife who are his neighbors have a duty to report to the police and the police have a duty to respond. You can never tell whether the next Osinachi would be your flesh and blood. God forbid!

Campos Square – Lagos, 23rd April 2022 – Austin Isikhuemen

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