The driver, Peter Okon, was said to have reported himself to the police after the incident and was kept in protective custody at the Police Station in Iwofe, near Port Harcourt.
The PUNCH reports that the crossdresser was knocked down by the keke while returning from a church programme in the evening on January 31, 2023.
After she passed on, her remains were deposited at the military hospital in Port Harcourt, where the mortician that removed her dress discovered her true sex.
Okon, while speaking with newsmen in Port Harcourt through his lawyer, Nyeche Amah, said he did not hit and killed the crossdresser woman as being reported in social media.
Amah stated, “I feel very bad and disappointed with the information making the rounds that my client, (Mr. Peter Okon) hit the crossdresser person.
“The name of the crossdresser is actually Emmanuel Oliseh Ogaebulam from Anambra State.
“What actually happened was that the crossdresser was my client’s passenger. While the Keke driver was driving, there was a little girl with a wheelbarrow trying to cross the road.
“In an attempt for my client to dodge the little girl carrying the wheelbarrow and crossing the road, he has to swerve. Unconsciously the transgender person fell out of the keke into the drainage.
“It would also interest you to know that the crossdresser is not the only one the driver was carrying. Unfortunately, the crossdresser was the only person who sustained injuries and later died.”
While noting that Mr Okon is ‘hale and hearty’, the lawyer said he was not detained, but in police protective custody after reporting himself, saying his client displayed maturity.
“Mr. Okon did all he could to protect everybody on the tricycle, but unfortunately the crossdresser made an attempt to jump out and fell into the drainage.
“The Keke driver displayed the highest level of maturity by reporting himself to the Rumulomeni Police Station at Iwofe when the incident occurred around Akar junction, Iwofe on night of January 31st, 2023.
“The Keke driver is not actually detained but kept in protective custody so that the driver does not get hurt by persons sympathetic to the crossdresser who may not have known what transpired,” Amah explained.
The PUNCH reports the crossdresser who goes by the name Emmanuelle Ada-obi whose real name was later revealed as Emmanuel Oliseh was a male crossdress chorister at a Catholic Church in St. Johns, Iwofe.
It was leant that she was about to get married to a man in the church before meeting the incident.
Meanwhile, a man seen in a viral picture with the transgender who was in traditional attire speculated to be the man who was engaged to the transgender has denied knowledge of her.
One of the late crossdresser’s neighbours who didn’t want his name in print said, “I heard that she had done her traditional marriage and that she was waiting for the white wedding.
“So, she joined this Catholic Church so that Father will join them in Holy Matrimony. She even joined the choir and was a member of the church.
“But when Father (presiding cleric) invited the man that wanted to marry her, the man denied any such plan. He lives abroad.”
But Okon’s lawyer told newsmen that the man in the viral picture went for a traditional marriage somewhere when the female who turned out to be a crossdresser begged to snap with him.
Efforts to reach the spokesperson of the State Police Command, Grace Iringe-Koko, proved abortive as of the time of filing this report.
