Arthur Blick and Noella Blick in a Mitsubishi Evo X cruised to victory in the FMU Championship Sprint on Sunday.
But their shine has been taken away by unpleasant scenes that transpired before the day’s races.
Co-driver Zubeda Abdallah was roughed up and denied entry to the rally venue.
A confrontation ensued between the gatemen and competitors.
However, Charles Ssemengo and FMU officials put the blame on event promoters.
“What happened to Zubeda was unfortunate. We didn’t expect it to happen that way.
“The problem is Balaam keeps changing the people he puts on the gates. The new who come don’t understand the sport. And besides, the tags given are still less, they need to look through that,” he said.
Balaam was apologetic on learning about what transpired.
“I am always given a contract which clearly tells me to give organising clubs tags for competitors, their team, sponsors and family which always do. And in this very event I gave FMU 350 tags as requested.
“I was not aware of what happened for sure. I advocate for transparency and respect for one another at all times.
“It’s so sad and regrettable if that happened. I really apologies to all those that were affected,” he said.
The incident has now drawn more discussion about the management of sprints and event promoters.
Several drivers are planning a boycott of upcoming events.
In 2015 during the Jinja Rally, Balaam’s men mishandled crew’s family members and service crews, denying them entry. It was eventually settled mutually with some agreements reached between the federation, competitors and promoters.
Among the agreement, included giving crews fourteen accreditation tags to drivers.
However, parties have not been fully committed to the agreement.