Johannesburg – The Democratic Alliance (DA) says it has written to the Acting Minister of Police, Professor Feroz Cachalia, to demand an explanation of why the Hawks were mobilised to raid the home of TikTok content creator Anton Taylor on suspicion of committing crimes against the state.
Taylor posted a satirical video on TikTok in March 2025, taking aim at the now-suspended Police Minister Senzo Mchunu.
Offended, Mchunu laid a criminal complaint with the police against Taylor on the basis that he considered the TikTok video “extremely, extremely hurting and damaging”.
MP Lisa Schickerling, the DA spokesperson on police matters, said after the complaint, Taylor’s home was raided by Hawks officers, and he was subsequently questioned.
“What the Hawks thought they would find by turning Mr. Taylor’s home inside out, when the ‘offending’ video was posted online, is anyone’s guess,” Schickerling said on Friday, 29 August 2025.
“Were the allegedly offensive remarks drifting around his living room?”
Schickerling said, after weeks of investigation by the Hawks and “hundreds of man-hours wasted on what can only be termed a ‘witch hunt’”, the National Prosecuting Authority has declined to prosecute Taylor.
“Let us be clear; Mr. Taylor’s video may have been provocative, but it was not criminal, and most definitely not a crime against the state,” Schickerling said.
“The Hawks, as a specialised crime-fighting unit, should know better than to allow itself to be weaponised against a citizen exercising his constitutionally guaranteed rights.
“Satire is not treason. Comedy is not sedition.”
