Nicknamed the “Elegant Stallion,” Onwenu moved a nation with her music, films, reporting, and political work
Onyeka Onwenu, who had a storied career across Nigerian entertainment, media, and politics, has died at age 72 in Lagos. The country’s president, Bola Tinubu, released a statement mourning the loss from his official X handle on July 31. Peter Obi, who ran for president against Tinubu in 2023 and lost, shared on X that he was at the hospital where Onwenu died. “I watched in pain as the doctors and medical staff fought tirelessly and battled to save her life, doing everything possible to bring her back to life but eventually came out with the sad news that she was gone,” he wrote. A cause of death was not immediately available.
On July 30, Onwenu had performed at a pharmaceutical executive’s 80th birthday party shortly before her death. “Just about a few minutes after her performance, she sat down and drank some water and immediately collapsed, and was rushed to the hospital,” Obi wrote. Afrobeats culture blog Notjustok shared footage of Onwenu joyously singing to the crowd.
Reverently called the “Elegant Stallion,” Onwenu was both one of Nigeria’s foremost pop stars and consequential journalists of the 1980s. Her popular songs include 1986’s “One Love,” a hopeful blend of reggae and synth pop, “Wait for Me,” a song encouraging family planning with juju star King Sunny Adé, folk love song “Iyogogo,” and “Winnie Mandela” which she performed for South African President Nelson Mandela and his wife when they visited Nigeria following his release from prison in 1990. She was also an anchor and reporter for the Nigerian Television Authority, and in 1984 led the station’s collaborative documentary with BBC Nigeria: A Squandering of Riches that exposed corruption in the country.
By the 1990s, Onwenu began to make gospel music and act, eventually starring in over a dozen films. In 2013, she played alongside Chiwetel Ejiofor, Thandiwe Newton, and John Boyega in Half of a Yellow Sun, based on the novel of the same name by formative Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. She later starred in the film Lionheart, directed by Genevieve Nnaji. It became Nigeria’s first-ever Oscar entry in 2019, but was disqualified from the international feature film category for being predominantly in English, though it is the country’s official language (the award had previously been known as “best foreign language film.”)
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“Lionheart was born out of a desire to honor and give flowers to the legends that made my childhood beautiful and memorable, whilst they were still with us,” Nnaji wrote on X. “I am so grateful she accorded me the opportunity, honor and privilege to share time and space with her.”
Onwenu avidly engaged in Nigeria’s social, economic, and political spheres, earning one of the nation’s highest honors in 2011 when she was named Member of the Order of the Federal Republic. She ran for public office twice, and though she lost both races, she was appointed chairperson of the Imo State Council for Arts and Culture by its governor in 2013 and later led Nigeria’s National Centre for Women Development. She completed her higher education in the U.S., earning her Bachelor’s degree in International Relations and Communications from Wellesley College and her Master’s in Communication and Media Studies from The New School.
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Nigerian singers like Yemi Alade and Simi as well as Lionheart distributor Netflix have posted tributes to the star on X. “My childhood hero,” wrote Alade. One of Burna Boy’s most popular songs from his Grammy-winning 2020 album Twice as Tall, “Onyeka,” expresses reverence for her.
In an op-ed from 2021 critiquing a wealthy businessman’s extravagant funeral for his mother as “Nigeria is wracked with widespread poverty and lack,” Onwenu laid out her hopes for her burial. “Do it quickly, quietly and privately,” she wrote. “Celebrate me with prayers, lunch or dinner afterwards. Share some jokes about me and laugh. Mourn, yes, but not excessively. Make merriment, and then go about your business. If my friends want to celebrate me, they should do so while I am alive, so that I can enjoy it with them, not when I am gone and have no idea about this. That is me, Onyeka Onwenu.”
