Joseph Michel Martelly (born 12 February 1961), also known by his stage name "Sweet Micky", is a Haitian politician, former musician and businessman, currently the incumbent President of Haiti.
In July 2010, he announced that he would be running for the Presidency of Haiti.
On 4 April 2011, a senior Haitian official announced that Martelly had won the second round of the election against candidate Mirlande Manigat.
Early Life
Martelly was born in Port-au-Prince, . The middle-class son of a Super Market supervisor, Martelly is a self-taught keyboard player and Mango seller. After graduating from high school, Martelly briefly worked for a construction company in the United States before he enlisted in the Haitian Military Academy. In 1986, after one semester, he returned to Haiti just as Jean-Claude Duvalier, then president-for-life, was heading into exile. Martelly later on returned to the U.S. with his then-girlfriend, Sophia, whom he later married in a small ceremony in Miami, Florida. Upon their return to Haiti, Martelly had his first breakthrough in the musical industry when he began playing keyboard as a fill-in musician in local venues in Pétionville and Kenscoff, some of the upscale suburbs of Port-au-Prince.
Personal Life
Martelly currently lives in Haiti, but held several homes in Palm Beach, Florida. He lives with his wife and former manager, Sophia, and their four children, Olivier, Sandro, Yani, and Malaika. In 2006, Martelly announced his unofficial retirement from recording and performing but two years later announced a return to music with a new single, Magouyè, and the video/short film, "Bandi Legal yo ki rive". He is a cousin of Port-au-Prince hotel manager and musician Richard Morse.
From : www.wikipedia.org
