Sergeant Chery Samson, talks on a phone at his desk in a small tent in a densely populated neighborhood in Petion-Ville. On Samson's desk is a bust of Toussaint L'Ouverture (who led the Haitian slave revolt and defeated Napoleon) and a rum bottle with a President Michel Martelly's face painted on it. Samson says that he is in charge of all of the troops in Haiti. Samson keeps a copy of the Haitian constitution on his desk and qoutes article 267-3 which says "(the government) does not have the right to decommission the military... the government does not have the right to put the military on leave" Samson who was in the Haitian army from 1980 to 1995 says "even though we didn't have resources we've always been the military and have always defended the interests of the military and the country" and "January 12th, the earthquake happened I was saving an old person's life and a house collapsed on me and I lost my hand. When I was in the hospital several commanders came and visited me and we decided that we needed to start getting organized and set up offices to control the whole army and we started re-mobilizing. .We are waiting for Michel Martelly to name the minister of defense and the major for the army. We are all in little groups and at that time we'll come together."
Add to Lightbox
