The SA Music Awards on Saturday night were such a shambles that some of the judges could not be seated for the ceremony.

Ukhozi FM's Phumlane Mbatha, better known by his stage name, DJ Sgqemeza, was part of the huge judging panel, which included his Ukhozi FM colleague Zandile Tembe and journalist and socialite Lesley Mofokeng.

They ended up watching the show on television after being given "the run-around" by the organisers.

The awards evening, moved from Sun City to Montecasino, north of Johannesburg, this year to make it more accessible to fans, was a disaster, with award winners reportedly taking up to three minutes to reach the stage.

"We [the judges] went the extra mile during the judging and gave our best, but then we didn't get the treatment we deserved on the big night," said Mbatha.

Mbatha thought the production was "a mess".

Lara Preston, managing director of publicists Red Flag, said yesterday: "Everyone has been at panic stations for the past few days. Red Flag got tickets on Wednesday and had to make sure all 400 invited media [representatives] got them by Thursday.

"I believe there were seating plan issues because of last-minute additions as well."

On Saturday night, the signage around Montecasino was poor and created a safety issue.

VIPs and fans shoved and shouted at each other, after ending up at the wrong entrances.

As the live broadcast began more than a quarter of the people were stuck outside.

Forty-five minutes into the show, people were still looking for their seats, and ushers were escorting guests to the wrong ones.

Some celebs also shared their displeasure on social networking site Twitter.

Flash Republic's leader singer Tamara Dey tweeted that she was pick-pocketed at an after-party. She had her iPhone stolen from her jacket.

The chief executive of the SA Music Awards, Jandre Louw, blamed the chaos on the ticketing system, and promised it would be "reviewed" at the post-mortems on the event.