Haiti Was Forced to Pay REPARATIONS To Its white Enslavers for 122 Years—The Debt That Bankrupt a Na

The enslaved Black African population in Saint-Domingue, present-day Haiti, was estimated to be roughly 500,000. Enslaved Black Africans made up nearly 90% of the colony's total population of 560,000, creating the largest and most profitable slave society in the Caribbean.
The sheer scale of this enslaved population made Saint-Domingue France's richest colony, largely driven by the brutal, backbreaking labor on thousands of sugar and coffee plantations in Saint-Domingue.
The mortality rate was staggeringly high, requiring plantation owners to continually import tens of thousands of enslaved people from Africa each year to sustain their workforce. Driven by these oppressive conditions, the enslaved African population launched the Haitian Revolution in 1791. By 1804, they successfully overthrew French colonial rule, oppressing and the system of slavery, establishing Haiti as the world's first free Black republic.

Jean-Pierre Boyer: The man who agreed to the debt payment to the French.
Jean-Pierre Boyer was born in Port-au-Prince and was the biracial son of a French tailor and an African mother, a slave from the Congo. He was sent to France by his father for his education. During the French Revolution, he served as a battalion commander, and fought against Toussaint Louverture in the early years of the Haitian Revolution. He later allied himself with André Rigaud, also of mulatto ancestry, in the latter's abortive insurrection against Toussaint to try to keep control of the southern region of Saint-Domingue (modern-day Haiti).

After going into exile in France during the Haitian Revolution, Boyer and Alexandre Pétion returned in 1802 with the French troops led by General Charles Leclerc. After it became clear the French were going to try to reimpose slavery and restrictions on free gens de couleur, Boyer joined the patriots under Pétion and Jean-Jacques Dessalines, who led the colony to independence. After Pétion rose to power in the Republic of Haiti in the South, he chose Boyer as his successor. He was reportedly under the influence of his (and his predecessor's) lover and mistress, Marie-Madeleine Lachenais (a mulatto), who acted as his political adviser. (Boyer’s political adviser was his mistress).
Boyer was anxious to eliminate the threat from France and opened negotiations. An agreement was reached on 11 July 1825, when Boyer signed an indemnity treaty. It stated that France would recognize Haiti as an independent country in return for 150 million francs paid within five years. While this sum was later reduced to 90 million francs (in 1838), it was the blow that crushed Haiti’s economy.