Osinachi Nwachukwu, the golden voice of gospel music, set the media aflame at such a time as lent which preceded Easter Sunday, when Christians celebrated the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ this year, 2022. In that Easter season, the death of the singer, who usually held worshippers spellbound, putting them effortlessly in the spirit as she sang gospel tunes, trended. It was then that many got to know that Osinachi, among others, sang the song they had relished…
_Ekwuemeeee…Ekwueme, you are the living God oooo…_ Osinachi Nwachukwu was said to have died as a result of physical abuse she suffered in the hands of a husband who evidently connected with her in a union of matrimony to produce children that called them mum and dad.From indications, she was the chief breadwinner of the family and her article of trade was her voice.
That’s not strange in this age when family earnings are thinning down and no one can fully depend on the husband for finances. She toured places, availed people of her voice and brought goose pimples out of skins of those who heard her sing. When she sang, Heaven touched the Earth. Ostensibly, she won souls for Christ in the process. Ultimately, money rolled in, in fees and in donations.The money was not for her alone to enjoy.
Indeed, stories abound that much of the proceeds of her exploits were enjoyed by Peter, the man she called husband, who, paradoxically, stands accused as her killer. How odd for a man to slaughter the goose that lays the golden egg for him!We heard so much about the marriage of Peter and Osinachi. Much was hearsay. There may have been a greater volume of their love life that might never be told. But about the little told, true or false, tongues wagged, hairs were raised, brains rationalised, virtual courts sat in the various social media platforms where pocket lawyers made several submissions that only God would digest in his silent abode in heaven and, silently also, He would pass judgement. His ways are not our ways.
Osinachi was said to have suffered all in the hands of Peter with equanimity. Whoever tried to rise against her husband, her supposed tormentor-in-chief, she begged to calm down, to seal the ugly details of her marriage, to save the union from shame.Her public appearances belied the humiliation she was said to have faced at home. On stage, she did not fail to light up the environment for the audience or congregation to feel the luminous spirit of Christ around them. Suddenly, her world came crashing and, as her Pastor, Paul Enenche, narrated, she began to visit hospital after hospital, diagnostic centre after another, before she died.The noise about this legend’s demise has gone down as she has been laid to rest.
What lessons did she teach mankind? Osinachi mirrored a society far sunk in bullying and brutality. The culture of violence, verbal and physical, pervades the environment we live in. The women in the house run their mouth and subject the men to emotional torture, to the extent that the men are often forced to use their hands to quieten their verbal tormentors. And we call it domestic violence. In schools, students who grow in these houses of commotion carry their acquired traits to school, taking delight in bullying on the junior ones to the level that some instances result in deaths.
Rather than make formal love advances and enjoy the fruit of their labour in peace, randy young men choose to take the girls by force. On the streets, pedestrians howl at motorists, who also yell at each other at the slightest chance. Traffic becomes chaotic, even in smooth roads that required only tolerance for every Dick and Harry to pass through. It’s all rape, cultism, kidnapping, robbery and domestic violence stories that assail our senses daily.In the late gospel singer’s case, there have not been evidences that her husband visited all the alleged violence on her because she was cantankerous.
And, we must also note that the husband at the wake of the wife’s death, denied wrongdoing. She said his wife died of cancer, a claim her in-laws refuted. We might not have been witnesses to the terrible things said to have happened to our darling voice, but Osinachi stands as a big lesson to wife beaters, that beating a woman could lead to her death and the world will not spare them of its venom when that happens.
Wife beaters must note the trending potshot that says women speak 8,000 words a day against men’s 2,000, and advises the men to “please don’t raise your hands” on their shouting wives because they might be aiming to reach their “daily word target”.
For those wishing to tie the nuptial knots, the lesson is to choose your partner wisely and if you think seriously that you’ve made a mistake when you choose, apply the reverse gear and quit fast to save lives. Families must teach their boys how to be men and their girls how to be women. The women who become desperate for marriage should be made to know that marriage is not the only path to a woman’s dignity. If a lady can’t find true love, the safest thing for her is to stay single as none of the Ten Commandments compels us, “thou shall remain married for life.”
Going by the narratives within our reach, Osinachi knew she was being abused and did nothing about it. She resigned to her fate and faced the situation like the lamb being led to slaughter. Destiny was the determining factor. In other words, she was a sacrifice of sorts and Peter, her husband, if it is true that he physically abused her to her death, played the role of the Judas that sent her back to her creator. Were she to be of the Catholic faith, one would have asked that the Pope begins a process of beatification with the aim of canonizing her saint, the patron saint of all abused women in marriage. Perhaps, if a victim of domestic violence, man or woman, prays through her, God would open the heavens to hear his or her supplications.Domestic violence, verbal or physical, must be avoided. Our world is in dire need of peace.
“Osinachi was said to have suffered all in the hands of Peter with equanimity. Whoever tried to rise against her husband, her supposed tormentor-in-chief, she begged to calm down, to seal the ugly details of her marriage, to save the union from shame.Her public appearances belied the humiliation she was said to have faced at home. On stage, she did not fail to light up the environment for the audience or congregation to feel the luminous spirit of Christ around them“
Dr. Odu can be reached at dirimrich2018@gmail.com