In Madiba's Footsteps

In 1962, Nelson Mandela secretly and illegally left South Africa to spend seven months travelling around Africa. The African National Congress, which had been banned by the apartheid state, had just launched its armed struggle. Mandela's mission was to drum up political and financial support from the rest of Africa, and find countries willing to train its military recruits - including himself. He received some military training in Morocco from Algerian soldiers, who were using Morocco as a base from which to fight French colonial rule. And the rest took place in Ethiopia. Colonel Fekadu Wakene, a retired military man from Ethiopia, recalling his time with Nelson Mandela.

And you can hear more about that time and the rest of Mandela's trip around the African continent in 1962 in the documentary 'in Madiba's African Footsteps' on the BBC World Service tomorrow at 09 - GMT