Cecilia Anim knew she wanted to be a ‘big wife’ (a midwife) after she heard babies crying in a maternity hospital in Kumasi. Her nursing story began there. She is now serving her second term as President of the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) – the first person of BAME origin elected to the office.
Cecilia walks briskly into the RCN headquarters, unhampered by her bright orange high heels. She’s always racing between her nursing practice at Margaret Pyke Centre, political rallies, and her duties at RCN HQ, 20 Cavendish Square. She served as a RCN steward for 17 years before her election and she jokes with the staff we pass.
Cecilia leads me past the grand old painted stairwell and a marble fireplace bearing the mask of Medusa, the Gorgon. 20 Cavendish Square was built for a merchant of the East India Tea Company and is now presided over by a market traders’ daughter from a former British Colony.
Cecilia’s outfit – a Ghanaian wax print dress and a sharp tailored jacket – stands out in the refurbished Georgian building. She brings inspirations from home, where she learned the ‘dynamics of listen and be listened to’ from growing up in a large family under the judicious gaze of her mother (now 102, a market trader) and grandmother.
Cecilia moved to the UK through the Scholarship Secretariat in 1972. Despite having delivered breach babies by herself in a rural area, Cecilia’s midwifery training was not recognized in the UK. She started afresh training in sexual health nursing, partly because obstetrics had become so machine-driven: ‘I wasn’t prepared to lower the skills that I have.’
Cecilia takes diplomacy to an art form. When patients in the late 1970s mistook her for the cleaner because she was African, Cecilia was mainly concerned it would break the trust when she gently corrected them. Cecilia was the first BAME nurse at Margaret Pyke Centre when she joined in ‘79, and emphasizes how much understanding of equality has improved since then.
She led 3000 people on a ‘Scrap the Cap’ rally, which resulted in Jeremy Hunt revoking the 1 per cent pay cap for NHS staff in 2017. She’s dedicated her life to women’s health and the NHS – the story isn’t over yet.
by Laura Mitchison