ZAPU met in Geneva in January 1976 to form an alliance known as the Patriotic Front. Other groups followed suit, and the pressure began to mount for the Rhodesian Front.
             By late 1979, Smith had been forced into a corner, and after fourteen weeks of talks, the Lancaster Agreement was signed, bringing about the first free elections in which both whites and blacks could vote, in March of 1980. As part of the Lancaster Agreement, the Rhodesian Front were to keep 20 of the 100 Parliamentary seats, but Mugabe's ZANU party emerged as the clear leader with an overall majority of 57 seats.
             Zimbabwe seemed to be off to a promising start in the early eighties, but the elation quickly faded, with the resurrection of old rivalries between ZANU (mostly comprised of the majority Shona tribe) and ZAPU (representing the minority Ndebele), which led to armed conflicts between the two. In 1983, the situation culminated with the mobi
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