BY TIMOTHY AGBOR, OSOGBO
A middle-aged woman, Ogochukwu Anene, has been confirmed dead a few days after her husband, Ndubisi Wilson Uwadiegwu, allegedly beat her to stupor after the deceased complained about a loaf of bread.
It was gathered that the late mother of four children, had in the morning of December 3, 2022, asked her husband to give her money to prepare breakfast for their children but Uwadiegwu was said to have shunned her request.
Ogochukwu, who hailed from Umuokpu village in Awka, Anambra State, had used her money to get a loaf of bread for the children to take for breakfast. She was said to have kept the bread inside the kitchen for the kids.
However, trouble started after the children visited the kitchen to take the bread and they could not find it. It was learnt that the children had informed their mother that their father had eaten the bread.
Angered by this, Ogochukwu reportedly went to Uwadiegwu and demanded an explanation for eating the bread meant for the children. Consequently, a disagreement ensued and the husband was accused of beating the wife with a mirror till blood started gushing out of her.
The Point gathered that Ogochukwu, popularly known as Ada Akwa by her friends and school mates, was said to have died eight days later at the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital, Enugu.
Findings revealed that the deceased was the Senior Prefect of her alma mater, Amenyi Girls Secondary School, Akwa in 2000. She was said to have been delivered of her babies through caesarian section after her marriage to her husband in 2007.
Meanwhile, the family has cried out for justice and alleged their in-law (Uwadiegwu) of attempting to bury Ogochukwu when investigation has not been concluded.
The family, while accusing Uwadiegwu, an indigene of Amichi Okunano, in Enugu South Local Government Area of Enugu State, of killing their daughter (Ogochukwu), also claimed that the Enugu State Police Command had released the suspect after claiming that autopsy conducted on Ogochukwu’s remains showed that she died through natural cause.
Speaking on a human rights radio programme in Abuja, which was monitored by The Point, the younger brother to the deceased, Ebuka Anene, accused Uwadiegwu of being in the habit of beating his late wife whenever there was a disagreement with them, not minding that she had been fragile due to medical operations she went through during child delivery.
“After a week and one day, at 2am in the midnight, my phone rang, Ogochukwu called me and I took the call, she was calling my name, “Ebuka, I am dying, I am weak, Jesus.” I was panicking that night because I wasn’t close. I was in Akwa. I woke my sister. Their first son, Uzochukwu, now took the phone from her mother (Ogochukwu) saying her mother was dying”
Narrating how the incident happened, Anene said, “The husband of my elder sister beat her to death. It took place on 3rd December, 2022, in the morning. It was because of breakfast that was made for the children because the man, Mr. Wilson Ndubisi Uwadiegwu told my sister he had no money for the breakfast. The wife then used her money to buy bread for the children so that they could eat something that morning.
“Surprisingly, the man ate up the full loaf of bread meant for the children’s breakfast and the children reported that their father had eaten it. When my sister went to him to complain about eating the children’s food, the man said she should not talk about that in his presence. From what I observed, it was as if there was a quarrel before the issue of breakfast. The man is not based in Enugu. He is based in Lagos. He always comes to Enugu in November and returns to Lagos in December. I don’t really know if there was an issue before but from how the man was speaking, it appeared there was an accumulated problem on the ground.
“The children explained to me that their father, Uwadiegwu, said he doesn’t have money for breakfast that morning and that the wife should not demand for such from him but he still went ahead and finished one loaf of bread bought for the children. He finished it without leaving any for the children that morning. That was why I said there might have been an accumulated issue on the ground because I wonder how a man can finish a full loaf of bread at a go.
“There was a time I visited their house at Thinkers Corner in Enugu in 2010, my sister was pregnant and the man still beat her up. Since then, I have not heard any other issue again. I didn’t know what caused the issue but she told me that the man beat her up. When I went there, my sister told me not to intervene because she already has a new baby. She said if I talk to him, who would train her children.
“From this current case, I found out that this man has been beating her and she had not been telling me or any other members of our family. When the man was transferred from Enugu to Lagos, she left Lagos saying Lagos is very rowdy. It was later I knew that it was because her husband used to beat her like a kid and their children confirmed it.
“Back to the current issue, on that fateful Saturday (December 3, 2022), the man asked the wife not to talk to him about breakfast. So, she continued complaining about what the children would eat first and later, they (parents) would look for what they would eat. The man later came to her and started beating her up. The man used a mirror that was hanging on the wall and she sustained perforation on her body. When the mirror broke, the man used the frame of the mirror, the thickness is like 2 by 4 planks, very heavy, and he used it to bombard my sister. God knows for how long.
“I wasn’t in Enugu on that fateful day but one of my sisters called another sister to rush to Ogo’s house that the husband was beating her and that he wanted to kill her. When they got to Uwadiegwu’s apartment, they saw a splash of mirrors everywhere on the ground and there were blood stains on the ground from the injury my sister sustained. They met her in the room crying and they confirmed that the blood was hers. They asked her what happened and she said the husband beat her because of breakfast. She got bruises on her body on that day.
“After a week and one day, at 2am in the midnight, my phone rang, Ogochukwu called me and I took the call, she was calling my name, “Ebuka, I am dying, I am weak, Jesus.” I was panicking that night because I wasn’t close. I was in Akwa. I woke my sister. Their first son, Uzochukwu, now took the phone from her mother (Ogochukwu) saying her mother was dying.
“It was their first son that explained to me that Uwadiegwu asked the children to park their things so that they can go to the village, after beating his wife. The children told me all these things and they said they refused to follow their father to the village. He left my sister in pain. The house help was also there, she should be about 22 to 23 years of age. Their first son is 14 years old while the last born is three years old. They narrated this entire story to me.
“I called the husband that his wife was dying and he now said he was on his way to Thinkers Corner where they were staying in Enugu. I asked him to rush.”
I called their landlord and he said they called him and that when he got there, my sister was in the toilet and that she complained of stomach ache. The landlord said he had flagged, the landlord now brought flagging and asked the son to give her, it was at this point that the son discovered that my sister had already slumped in the toilet. I begged the landlord to take my sister to the hospital, I called the son, and he said the father was now with them.
“They took her to Niger Foundation hospital in Enugu. According to the husband, the doctor said the wife was running low BP and that they have stabilized her. But when my other sister visited the hospital, she said the way Ogochukwu was looking suggested that she was really in pain. She was complaining of pain in her right side of the stomach. She told her that the doctors were running a test. She went to the toilet and came out without defecating. She returned and started complaining of the pain again.
“The doctors, after the test, said she was in a critical condition and that she should be taken to University Teaching Hospital, Enugu. The man (Uwadiegwu) was saying he wanted to leave to go home and freshen up and make food for the kids. My sister was surprised but the man later left.
When they got to UNTH, the doctors started attending to her and said she needed blood. After some time at the hospital, she was confirmed dead.
“We later reported at the Criminal Investigation Department of the Police in Enugu Command and Uwadiegwu was arrested. We asked the police to carry out an autopsy on our sister. It was done but on the day the autopsy would be conducted, we discovered that the police allowed another doctor said to have been paid by Uwadiegwu to observe the autopsy while there was no doctor from our side. We discovered this ourselves because the police didn’t tell us.
“The doctors later said they have done the autopsy but the result is not yet out but he is going to fill a form for the police. He said the result will be available in a week’s time. The doctor took my number and promised to send the result to me but failed to do so. It was later the police called me to say that the form the doctor filled that day already had the result of the autopsy and that my sister died a natural death.
“Therefore, the police said they can’t continue to keep Uwadiegwu in custody. The police said the result showed Ogochukwu had long accumulated BP and that her death was a natural cause. They didn’t give me any medical result or the form the doctor gave them, they said it is for the police only. An Assistant Commissioner of Police at the CID told me this. I asked them to push the matter to court and I angrily left there.
They released him (Uwadiegwu) that evening. This is why I contacted human rights for them to join our family in getting justice for Ogochukwu,” Anene noted.
However, Ogochukwu’s death has been drawing condolences and anger from her friends, especially on social media.
While others have been expressing shock at the worsening domestic violence in the country, they called on the police to ensure justice is done on the matter.
Efforts to get reactions from the police and Uwadiegwu had not yielded positive results as at the time of filing this report.
The remains of Ogochukwu were said to have been deposited at a morgue.
