ABSTRACT
Born on 18 July 1918 into the royal Xhosa clan in the village of Qunu, southern Transkei, Nelson Mandela was educated at the University of Fort Hare. His life was marked by political activism: from a student campaigning for equality for blacks, to a lawyer defending victims of apartheid, to commander of the African National Congress’s underground guerrilla army. In June 1964, he was convicted of trying to overthrow the white minority government and sentenced to life imprisonment. He spent twenty-seven years in jail before being released in February 1990.
