Piers Morgan has claimed his fight for “free speech” is similar to that of former South African leader Nelson Mandela in his fight against apartheid.

Morgan believes his exit from his longtime position at Good Morning Britain (GMB) was an attack on his freedom of speech after getting into an on-air spat over Meghan Markle’s Oprah Winfrey tell-all interview.

While promoting his new show Uncensored, Morgan said: “I feel like Nelson Mandela when he came out of prison. It’s like the long walk to free speech freedom.”

Morgan faced immediate criticism on social media for his controversial claim.

Morgan shared photos of himself with the freedom fighter to his Twitter saying he was happy to further the upset people felt over his claims.

“Twitter seems very upset by me comparing myself to Nelson Mandela with my ‘long walk to freedom of speech’ quote. So here are some pix of me having fun with the great man to really wind you all up…,” he wrote.

Morgan said his leave from GMB was an absurdity that lead to his career taking a leap to defend “free speech”.

“I thought the whole thing was a farce and I’m delighted that actually, as a result of the farce, we’ve ended up with a whole network which is now dedicated to preventing that kind of farce from recurring,” he said.

The British broadcaster went on to say his new show aims to “uncancel those who have been cancelled”.

The outspoken TV personality was recently in the news for criticising Disney over their decision to promote diversity and inclusion by removing gendered pronouns at their parks.