Pius A. Anadu (1940–2014)

the age of 74. Pius was the first Nigerian member of the Primate Specialist Group and during a distinguished career played a leading role in primatology, mammalogy and wildlife conservation in Nigeria. He participated in surveys in the 1980s that led to the re-discovery of wild populations of white-throated monkeys (Cercopithecus erythrogaster) and Sclater's monkeys (Cercopithecus sclateri), two little-known species that had been feared to be possibly extinct; and he helped to establish the Okomu Wildlife Sanctuary (now National Park), a key conservation area for the white-throated monkey and other threatened species, including red-capped mangabeys. Pius was born on 11 November 1940 in Nnewi, in what is now Anambra State, in eastern Nigeria. He grew up in a large, loving family with numerous sisters and brothers, cousins, nieces and nephews. He won a scholarship to study zoology at University College Ibadan (now the University of Ibadan), graduating with a B.Sc. in 1964. His subsequent career was interrupted by the Nigerian civil war. Not long before the outbreak of war in 1967 he relocated to the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, in what was soon to become Biafra. After the conflict began Pius enlisted as an officer in the Biafran army, and was subsequently wounded in the fighting. When the civil war ended in 1970, Pius returned to Ibadan, and, in 1973, completed his doctoral thesis on the ecology and breeding biology of small mammals under the supervision of Dr. David Happold. The data from some of the papers that Pius published based on this research were used for species profiles in the Mammals of Africa (2013), a testimony to the lasting value of his work. In 1979, Pius transferred from Ibadan to the University of Benin, where he was initially a senior lecturer in Zoology and eventually the Acting Head of the Department for Forestry and Wildlife. Increasingly he dedicated himself to the conservation of endangered species and to the protection of the environment in Nigeria, and was one of the first to draw attention to the impact of the commercial bushmeat trade on African forest wildlife. In 1988, he was appointed Executive Director of the Nigerian Conservation Foundation in Lagos and built an international reputation for both himself and the foundation; in 1992, under Pius's leadership , NCF won a UNEP Global 500 Roll of Honour award. After leaving NCF in 1994, Pius worked with the British Council in Lagos …