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After Supreme Court’s Decision, Portland Cement Ownership Remains With Dr. Rajan Mahtani

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Decision making across judiciary institutions is a tough act. The judges, lawyers and all individuals associated with a court system are working towards a common goal, giving justice to those seeking it with evaluation of the all evidences. However, despite this common vision, judiciary systems face unprecedented challenges due to lack of transparency, trust and knowledge. More often than not, legal and judiciary systems in developing nations such as Zambia face challenges due to corruption and unethical practices within. A similar challenge was faced by Dr. Rajan Mahtani after he first approached the Zambian judiciary system.

Dr. Rajan Lekhraj Mahtani is a noted businessman and philanthropist in Zambia. For more than three decades, Dr. Rajan Mahtani has been relentlessly working towards development of ethical and transparent companies in Zambia. He even worked towards developing Portland Cement Zambia as a profitable and notable companies in Zambia before it was unethically taken over by the Ventriglia family. A case battle started at the Lusaka High Court which dragged for more than a decade. Despite this, the final decision from the Lusaka High Court was controversial with the Ventriglia family announced as only shareholder of the Portland Cement Zambia.

Dr. Rajan Mahtani then approached the higher Court of Appeal. The judge at the higher Court of Appeal gave the decision in favour of Dr. Rajan Mahtani by announcing him the majority shareholder of Portland Cement with 58 percent shares as well as legal owner. This decision from the higher Court of Appeal came on 31st January 2019 and after more than 1.5 years of this decision, the Ventriglia family decided to appeal against the decision. This decision was then taken to the Supreme Court Zambia wherein a bench of three SC judges was established for evaluating the claim. After evaluation, it was found that the Ventriglia family failed to register their claim within 14 days of the higher Court of Appeal’s decision. As such, their claim was effectively rejected by the Supreme Court Zambia.

Zambezi Portland Cement factory ownership given back to Dr. Rajan Mahtani after Court win

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Zambezi Portland Cement factory ownership given back to Dr. Rajan Mahtani after Court win

While the final judgement from the Lusaka High Court judge on the Portland Cement Zambia case shocked everyone, same cannot be said for the Court of Appeal. After the factory was taken away from Dr. Rajan Mahtani, he approached the Lusaka High Court with expectations of quick judgement considering the significant evidences he had. Despite this, the judge was unable to give justice and a controversial judgement was given which prompted Dr. Mahtani to approach the higher Court of Appeal.

The judge at the Court of Appeal was justice Mwinde who announced the final decision on 31st January 2019. According to this decision, Dr. Rajan Lekhraj Mahtani was announced as majority shareholder and legal owner of the factory. The justice came at this decision after looking into several evidences and testimonials which were controversially ignored by the previous judge at the Lusaka High Court. The judge at the Court of Appeal was justice Mwinde and he arrived at his decision from numerous evidences and testimonials. For instance, one of the major evidences found was that Dr. Rajan Mahtani had already made a payment of 1 billion kwachas or USD 250,000 to the Zambezi Portland Cement for covering the entire share capital value of the Zambezi Portland Cement. This transaction was further recorded in the page 663- Volume ‘Record of Appeal’ of the original agreement between shareholders established in the year 2007. Evaluation of this document also clarified the fact that Dr. Rajan Mahtani did not owe any further amount to the Portland cement factory as he has already completed all his dues for the 58 percent shares, he owned at the Portland Cement Zambia factory.

The court also confirmed that Dr. Rajan Mahtani was free from all forgery charges as the allegations were in itself void and baseless. As of now, Dr. Rajan Mahtani is the definitive owner of the Portland Cement Zambia factory.