Martin Pickford

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Martin Pickford is a Kenyan-born paleontologist and the discoverer of Orrorin tugenensis, a hominid primate species that existed between 5.8 and 6.2 million years ago and a possible ancestor of the better-understood Australopithecus genus.

1 Controversy and Discovery of Orrorin
- 1.1 Background
2 Sources
3 External links

[edit] Controversy and Discovery of Orrorin

[edit] Background

At the time of Orrorin's discovery, researchers wishing to carry out palaeontological research in Kenya were required to be affiliated with an officially sanctioned Kenyan research organization. Prior to 1993 the only institution with this privilege was the Kenya National Museums, in which Pickford was Head of the Department of Sites and Monuments from 1978 to 1984. As such the museum and its director used to enjoy a monopoly on palaeontological research in Kenya. However, 7 years before the discovery of Orrorin in 2000, following intense pressure from the international community, the Kenyan Government liberalised many facets of the political, economic and bureaucratic life of the country, and this included the monopoly on the country's paleontological and archeological resources that the National Museums of Kenya and its director Richard Leakey had previously enjoyed, both prior to, and following, the country's independence in 1963.

In 1984, Pickford was congratulated in writing by the then director of the National Museums of Kenya Richard Leakey, with whom Pickford had attended high school in Nairobi, for completing three two-year contracts at the museum. Leakey informed Pickford that it was not possible to renew the contract a fourth time, as at that time there was a government-set limit placed on the quantity of such renewals. Pickford then settled in France, and in 1985, after contacting the Uganda Government, he launched the Uganda Paleontology Expedition, which upset Richard Leakey so much (he hadn't been consulted) that in a fit of anger he banned Pickford from any further research in Kenya.

From 1971 to 1978 Pickford had carried out extensive research in the Tugen Hills under a permit issued by the Kenyan Office of the President. During the surveys Pickford and his team found many important fossils ranging in age from 15 million to 2 million years old. In 1974 he found the first hominid from the 6 million-year-old Lukeino Formation (published in Nature in 1975) a lower molar which is today included in the hypodigm of Orrorin tugenensis. Subsequently, in 1978 Andrew Hill, a paleontologist based at Yale University obtained a permit through an affiliation with the National Museums of Kenya, and thereby displaced Pickford from an area that he had researched for 9 years.

1n 1997, before applying for renewal of research permission in order to continue his research programme which had been interrupted nearly 20 years previously, Pickford wrote to Kenya's Office of the President asking whether any other team was carrying out research in the Tugen Hills - after three months a reply was received from the Minister of Research indicating that after making investigations on the ground, his personnel had established that no-one had done any field research in the area since 1993, and that consequently he saw no hindrance to Pickford's application. He suggested that Pickford should apply for an affiliation with the Community Museums of Kenya, an NGO (non-government organisation) that had recently been licenced by the government. Andrew Hill claims that the site on which Orrorin was found was actually included in his permit.

On October 30, 1998, Pickford was issued a permit to carry out research in the Tugen Hills of Kenya under the auspices of the Collège de France, Paris with an affiliation to the Community Museums of Kenya. The Community Museums of Kenya, which had been founded by Eustace Gitonga and other prominent Kenyan citizens in 1997, was accredited by the Kenyan government (and therefore had the power to apply for research permits). An attempt to revoke Pickford's permit in the form of a letter ostensibly written by the Office of the President Daniel arap Moi dated November 2, 1998, and handed to Pickford by Stephen Gitau, a student at the National Museum of Kenya, proved, even on the basis of cursory examination, to be an inept and crude forgery. On being confronted with this forgery, Gitau soon left Kenya, ending up in the USA.

Despite having a valid research permit, during a subsequent visit to Kenya, Pickford was arrested at the instigation of Richard Leakey who was, at the time, the Chief Secretary to the Kenyan Government. At the trial, which was held in April 1999, the case was declared nolle prosequi. Soon afterwards, Leakey lost his government position.

In 2002, Pickford and his team erected the Kipsaraman Community Museum in the Tugen Hills, which displays casts of Orrorin, along with many other spectacular fossils from the region. The original Orrorin fossils are curated by the Community Museums of Kenya, where researchers from the international scientific community are free to examine them upon request to its Director, Mr Eustace Gitonga.