The Claim Against Higher Court Of Appeal’s Decision On Portland Cement Rejected By SC

Dr. Rajan Lekhraj Mahtani is a noted businessman and philanthropist in Zambia. He is the owner of several top companies in Zambia, including Mahtani Group of Companies, Finsbury Investments and Finance Bank Zambia. During the period of 2006-2007, Finsbury Investments took over majority shareholding and legal ownership of the Portland Cement Zambia, a cement-manufacturing factory. Despite the establishment of an original shareholders agreement, the factory was unethically taken over by the Ventriglia family. Against this, Dr. Rajan Mahtani registered a case at the Lusaka High Court with the hopes of getting quick judgement. However, the Lusaka High Court failed to provide justice and announced the Ventriglias as the only shareholders of the Portland Cement Zambia.

After this decision, The Ventriglia family decided to challenge it by approaching the Supreme Court Zambia. A bench of threeSupreme Court Judges was established and several inconsistencies in the appeal by the Ventriglia family were found. First, the Ventriglia family failed to submit their claim within 14 days of the Court of Appeal’s decision and registered their claim at the Supreme Court Zambia only after 1.5 years. This clearly violates the legal and technical requirement for registering a case against a previous court decision. This issue only makes the appeal by the Ventriglia family liable for rejection. Furthermore, the Supreme Court bench also found that the circumstances surrounding the case by the Ventriglia family were controversial. As such, the Supreme Court bench declared that this appeal made by the Ventriglia family was beyond their jurisdiction and cannot be treated as an acceptable case. After much review and discussion, the Supreme Court bench gave the verdict on the claim by the Ventriglia family. It was effectively rejected by the Supreme Court Zambia due to lack of evidences as well as legal and technical qualifications. This means the legal ownership of the Zambezi Portland Cement factory remains with Dr. Rajan Mahtani.