Transgender beauty queen, Miss Sahhara is
currently representing Nigeria in the 2016
Miss Trans Star International pageant
holding in Barcelona, Spain. Sahhara, whose
real name is Clifford Oche, recently shared
some photos from the event. (See here)
The Nigerian Transgender has now been
interviewed by AFP Read excerpts as you
continue...
Miss SaHHara was born in the wrong
country, and in the wrong body. Repression
in her native Nigeria almost drove her to
suicide, but this weekend she was cruising
down the runway in a cream dress -- one of
several finalists at the Miss Trans Star
International beauty pageant in Barcelona,
Europe's main such event.
Set up in 2010 in the Spanish Mediterranean
seaside city, the fifth edition of the contest
this weekend crowned Brazil's Rafaela
Manfrini as this year's transsexual queen,
although winning was secondary for
participants who have often experienced
discrimination and repression.
Among the candidates were transsexuals
from Japan, South Africa, Colombia, Turkey,
and Nigeria, whose activist chat stood out.
Sporting a cream dress with a plunging
neckline, Miss SaHHara glided down the
runway without a hint of shyness, drawing in
the 300-strong audience with her light-green
eyes.
Nothing much remained from the young 19-
year-old man who fled Nigeria for London
more than a decade ago.
"I had severe disphoria. My breasts weren't
growing, I didn't have a vagina, I looked at
myself in the mirror and I did not feel
comfortable with my body," she told AFP
before the gala final Saturday.
Miss SaHHara, as she is known, always knew
she was a woman.
She would put on make-up and wear her
mother's high heels.
But in Nigeria, where homosexuality and
transsexuality are illegal and punishable by
14 years in jail, her situation was tough.
"In the street, they were always attacking me,
harassing me," she said. "I came back home
and my family would harass me, they said
'you're wrong, you need to change, act like a
man'."
She twice attempted suicide and says she
was imprisoned in Nigeria for wearing
women's attire before escaping to London,
first as an illegal migrant, then as a refugee.
"There was no way I could have survived in
Nigeria, this is why I had to leave," she said.
In Britain, she underwent surgery to become
a woman with long, curly blond hair, big
breasts and full lips. She works as a model
and singer, and also manages her own NGO
to help transsexuals.
"London gave me the opportunity to pursue
my dreams and be my true self," she said.
"I'm hoping that by speaking out and coming
to Miss Star, I will try to influence people or
perhaps influence my government to revoke
14 years imprisonment for LGBT in Nigeria."
Lindaikeji
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