On most Sunday mornings, the searing voice of Osinachi Nwachukwu, one of Nigeria’s best-known gospel singers, filled the vast 100,000-seat auditorium of her church in Abuja.
Footage from one of the last times she led the choir at the Dunamis International Gospel Centre showed her singing the 2017 gospel hit Ekwueme, her eyes pressed closed and hand outstretched in prayer.
On 8 April, the 42-year-old died at a hospital in Abuja, Nigeria’s capital. Her husband and manager, Peter Nwachukwu, a pastor, said she had been suffering from an undisclosed illness, but in the days that followed family members and friends alleged that she had died from injuries sustained from domestic abuse.
Her four children told Nigerian authorities that Nwachukwu had suffered constant violence at the hands of their father, who they said had sworn them to secrecy. People who knew the couple cast Peter Nwachukwu as a dominating figure, controlling her finances and decisions.
On 11 April, police arrested Peter Nwachukwu and said they were waiting for autopsy results to help determine the cause of death. He has denied all allegations of abuse, telling police he was not responsible for his wife’s death.
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