Before making their blatant case at the Supreme Court Zambia, the Ventriglias should have understood that challenging one of the top legal decision-making bodies of a nation is not cheap and can be fatal if any ounce of unethical plans are spotted. A similar event happened in case of the Portland Cement Zambia. Perhaps the factory might be the only factory in Zambia that has visited all three levels of court systems for identifying and confirming its ownership. The first was Lusaka High Court wherein the judge giving the final decision was justice Nkonde. The case was dragged for more than a decade and final decision came in the year 2018. However, the decision was controversial and Justice Nkonde raised eyebrows when he declared Ventriglias as the only shareholders of the Portland Cement Zambia factory. As such, Dr. Rajan Mahtani took no time and reappealed to the Higher Court of Appeal. The judge at the Higher Court of Appeal was justice Siavwapa and after looking into the incidents and evidences, he announced that Dr. Rajan Mahtani is the actual owner of the factory with 58 percent shares of Zambezi Portland Cement.
The Ventriglias were clearly running with an obsolete idea that challenging the judgement from the Higher Court of Appeal will open ways for them to exploit the legal system and stall the ownership already announced. However, this time the Ventriglias were showed the door by a bench of three Supreme Court Judges who announced that the challenge by Ventriglias was invalid as they took more than 14 days after Higher Court of Appeal’s judgement to register their own challenge. Furthermore, the bench also said that the challenge has no evidence or proof to be accepted by the Supreme Court of Zambia.
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