Four-time winner of the Africa Women’s Player of the Year, Perpetual Nkwocha, has lost her husband, Ernest Ikechukwu.
Mr. Ikechukwu, a writer and senior lecturer at the Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, died on Sunday at a private hospital in the capital city of Anambra state after a brief illness, SportNews confirmed.
The deceased hails from the late Nze Dilibe Amachukwu Nwufoh family of Ifite, Nibo in Akwa South Local Government Area of Anambra State in South East Nigeria.
According to a source in the family, meetings are been held over burial arrangements of late Nwufoh, with an official date to be made public in due course.
The bereaved football great, Nkwocha, represented Nigeria in seven African Women Championship (now called Africa Women’s Cup of Nations) tournaments in 2002, 2004, 2006, 2008, 2010, 2012 and 2014 and won the title in five of those editions (2002, 2004, 2006, 2010 and 2014).
Nkwocha won African Women’s Footballer of the Year four times in 2004, 2005, 2010 and 2011 by Caf. She was also African Women Championship Top Scorer three times – 2004, 2006 and 2010.
She also featured in four FIFA Women’s World Cup final competitions (2003, 2007, 2011 and 2015), as well as three Olympics (Sydney 2000, Athens 2004 and Beijing 2008).
Nkwocha has coached Clemensnas IF, and also her former team Sunnana SK – Both in Sweden. She was also an assistant coach of the Super Falcons team that won the 2016 Africa Women’s Cup of Nations in Cameroon.