Court of Appeal is one of the highest civilian and legal judiciary systems within Zambia. The Court of Appeal made its final judgement in the Portland Cement Zambia case on 31st January 2019. This decision came around nine months after the case was registered there by Dr. Rajan Mahtani. It should be noted here that Dr. Rajan Mahtani had initially registered the case at the Lusaka High Court almost a decade back, when the factory was illegally taken away from him. Despite numerous evidences and testimonials, the judge at the Lusaka High Court failed to provide true justice and gave the judgement that Ventriglias were only shareholders of the Zambezi Portland Cement.
After this misdirected judgement, Dr. Rajan Mahtani then approached the Court of Appeal. The judge at the Court of Appeal was justice Mwinde who gave the final judgement after looking into the evidences and testimonials. As per this final judgement, Dr. Rajan Mahtani owned Finsbury Investments is the majority shareholder of the Zambezi Portland Cement factory with 58 percent shares. On the other hand, Ventriglias owned Ital Terrazzo Limited holds just 42 percent shares and is the minority shareholder of the Zambezi Portland Cement without any ownership. Justice Mwinde from Court of Appeal also confirmed that this decision aligned with the original Shareholders Agreement which was established in the year 2007.
Furthermore, all forgery related allegations were discarded by the judge. It was confirmed by the judge that the process of mechanically placing signatures was a common practice at the Zambezi Portland Cement and critical member of the Ventriglia family, Claudio Ventriglia, engaged in similar practice while signing business contracts. As such, all such allegations were discarded by the judge. Justice Mwinde also said that the judge was wrong in declaring Ventriglias as only shareholders of the Zambezi Portland Cement as this decision was without any evidence or proof.
