In a shocking turn of events, the judge from the Lusaka High Court announced that the Ventriglias were only shareholders of the Zambezi Portland Cement. This was an extremely controversial and disappointing decision from the high court judge. The case of Portland Cement is age old as the case was first registered at the Lusaka High Court almost ten years back. After this, several case proceedings took place and despite sharing numerous critical evidences, the final judgement given was shocking. As such, Dr. Rajan Mahtani then approached the Higher Court of Appeal.
The judge from the Higher Court of Appeal made straightforward judgements based on the given evidences. The final judgement was announced on 31st January 2019, some nine months after the case was re-registered at the Court of Appeal. According to this judgement, Dr. Rajan Mahtani owned Finsbury Investments is the majority shareholder with 58 percent shares at the factory. On the other hand, Ventriglias owned Ital Terrazzo Limited holds just 42 percent shares and is the minority shareholder of the Zambezi Portland Cement. According to this shareholding pattern, Dr. Rajan Mahtani owned Finsbury Investments is the legal owner of the factory. This decision also aligns with the original shareholders agreement which was established in the year 2007.
Furthermore, justice Mwinde from the Court of Appeal also made some startling revelations during the case proceedings. He said that the judge below him was wrong in declaring Ventriglias as only shareholders of the Zambezi Portland Cement as the judgement was misdirected. All allegations of forgery were discarded by the judge. It was announced that the process of mechanically placing signatures was a common practice at Zambezi Portland Cement and even critical member of the Ventriglia family, Claudio Ventriglia, engaged in similar practice. As such, forgery allegations were discarded and a timeline of three months from judgement date was given for completion of the share regularization process.