Governor Maura Healey on Tuesday declared today “Frantzdy Pierrot Day” in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, honoring the Haitian national team forward and Melrose High School alumnus at a State House celebration held just eighteen days before Haiti’s first appearance at the FIFA World Cup in 52 years.
The proclamation, read aloud by the Governor herself before a packed gathering inside the State House, marked a moment of formal recognition for an athlete whose path from Cap-Haïtien to the world stage has come to symbolize the journey of an entire community.
Boston City Councilor, Ruthzee Louijeune, announced that she had also proclaimed today Frantzdy Pierrot Day in the City of Boston, a parallel honor that drew applause from the attendees who filled the chamber.
But perhaps the most significant news of the afternoon came not from the elected officials but from Pierrot himself. Taking the microphone after the Governor’s remarks, the 31-year-old striker, who currently plays for Çaykur Rizespor in Turkey’s Süper Lig on loan from AEK Athens, used the occasion to officially introduce the Frantzdy Pierrot Foundation — a new organization that will serve as an umbrella for football academies and youth development clubs across Haiti, building pathways for thousands of young Haitian players to gain exposure to scouts, academies, and tryouts in Europe, North America, and South America.
For the diaspora community gathered in Boston, the announcement felt long overdue. Pierrot had previously founded the Frantzdy Pierrot Academy in Haiti, which has operated quietly, fully funded by Pierrot himself and run by family members on the ground. The Foundation announced Tuesday that it will formalize and expand that work into a structured organization built to outlast a single career.
A State House Filled With the Community
The atmosphere inside the Massachusetts State House on Tuesday afternoon reflected the moment’s scale. The chamber filled to capacity as Pierrot arrived for a live performance by Melrose student musicians, a welcome that drew on his own roots in the Middlesex County city, where he attended high school after moving from Haiti to Massachusetts at the age of eleven.
Boston-area media turned out in force. Cameras from major Massachusetts television, print, and digital outlets — NBC10 Boston, Boston 25 News, the Boston Globe, MassLive, and others were stationed throughout the chamber, joined by community media, including Caribbean Television Network.
The audience included members of Pierrot’s family, his brothers (one of whom, Frantz Pierrot, is also a professional footballer currently playing in Greece), and a remarkable cross-section of Massachusetts public officials and Haitian-American community leaders.
Among the elected officials present were Lieutenant Governor Kim Driscoll, Massachusetts State Senator Liz Miranda, State Representative Kate Lipper-Garabedian (who represents Melrose), and Mayor Jen Grigoraitis of Melrose — the first woman elected mayor of that city, who attended in support of one of her city’s most accomplished alumni.
The reach beyond Boston was equally meaningful. City officials from across the Commonwealth’s Haitian population centers had traveled to the State House for the occasion: Randolph Town Councilor Natasha Clemons, a Shirley Town Council member, and Brockton City Councilor Jean Bradley Derenoncourt were among those who came to honor Pierrot in person — a delegation that reflected the geographic breadth of Haitian community life in Massachusetts.
The Haitian community was represented at every level. Pastors, business leaders, university administrators, and cultural organizers attended, a testament to the gravity of the moment.
The Governor’s Proclamation
Governor Healey opened the formal program by acknowledging the historic timing of the gathering.
Eighteen days, she noted, separated the State House celebration from Haiti’s June 13 opening match against Scotland at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough — a match that will mark Pierrot’s first World Cup appearance and Haiti’s first appearance at the tournament since 1974. Healey, who, as Governor, is expected to remain neutral in sporting matters, broke from protocol with a smile to wish the Haitian team luck in its opening match, drawing laughter and applause from the Haitian Americans filling the chamber.
In her remarks, Healey reflected on the broader meaning of the moment for Massachusetts. The Commonwealth, she noted, is home to one of the largest Haitian-American communities in the United States, a community whose contributions span healthcare, business ownership, faith leadership, the arts, civic life, and athletics. Pierrot, she said, embodied the resilience that has defined the Haitian people and the Haitian-American community in Massachusetts.
The Governor described the unique obstacles Haiti’s national team has overcome on its road to the World Cup, including the inability to play true home qualifying matches due to the ongoing security crisis in Haiti, which has left many players’ family members in danger and uncertainty. Despite those conditions, she said, the team had not only survived but had qualified for the World Cup, inspiring a country and a diaspora in the process.
Healey then signed and presented Pierrot with the official proclamation declaring today Frantzdy Pierrot Day in Massachusetts. The proclamation, she noted with a smile, was physically larger than any she had previously signed, drawing sustained applause from the audience.
Ruthzee Louijeune: A Parallel Boston Proclamation
Following the Governor’s remarks, Boston City Council President Ruthzee Louijeune took the podium. Louijeune, the first Haitian American elected to the Boston City Council, announced that she had matched the Governor’s proclamation with one of her own at the city level: today is also officially Frantzdy Pierrot Day in the City of Boston.
In her remarks, Louijeune spoke of the symbolism of Pierrot’s journey for a community that has watched Haiti endure profound suffering even as its national team prepared for the World Cup. The fact that Haiti could not host a single home qualifying match on its own soil, she said, made the team’s qualification all the more meaningful. The image of a Haitian national team carrying the hopes of an entire country and its diaspora has become a powerful symbol for the community.
Louijeune also acknowledged the recent visibility of the Haitian community in Boston’s sports culture, citing the first-ever Haitian Night at the New England Revolution earlier this season and the third annual Haitian Night at Fenway Park with the Boston Red Sox the previous Friday. The Haitian community in Massachusetts, she said, is growing in confidence and in political and cultural power.
Pierrot Speaks: From Cap-Haïtien to the World Stage
When Pierrot finally took the stage, he was visibly moved.
He began by thanking Governor Healey, her team, the State House, his family, his coaches, his supporters, and the community that had come out to honor him. He then turned to his own story.
Pierrot was born in the town of Limbé near Cap-Haïtien, Haiti’s second-largest city and the place where Haitian independence was declared in 1804. He described his childhood there in simple terms: like many children in his community, he played football with whatever he could find — sometimes barefoot, sometimes using oranges as a ball.
At age eleven, his life changed when his father moved to the United States, and he and his brothers joined him in Massachusetts. Pierrot described the dislocation of arriving in America, a new language, a new culture, a new world. Football, he said, became his way forward.
He spoke openly about the difficulty of the years that followed. The early-morning training sessions before school. The long walks to catch the bus. The years in the lower divisions of European football — the fifth and fourth divisions, before reaching the elite levels of the European game. He described being drafted into Major League Soccer in the United States, then having to start again two weeks later when an opportunity arose in Belgium.
Pierrot’s professional career has since taken him from Mouscron in Belgium to Guingamp in France, to Maccabi Haifa in Israel — where his team faced Paris Saint-Germain in the UEFA Champions League and Pierrot found himself competing against Lionel Messi, Neymar, and Kylian Mbappé — and eventually to AEK Athens in Greece, where he remains under contract. He is currently on loan at Çaykur Rizespor in Turkey.
Through it all, he said, he had been told repeatedly that he was not good enough. Each rejection, he said, became motivation to continue.
Announcing the Foundation
Pierrot then turned to the second major announcement of the afternoon.
He told the audience that as he stood at the State House, he had come to recognize something specific about his position: he is one of the very few players from his region of Haiti, the area around Cap-Haïtien, to represent the country at the international level. Major European clubs, he observed, are filled with players from Africa and South America who have managed to find pathways to the global game from places often described in negative or stereotyped terms. Haiti, he said, has the same talent. What it lacks are the structures, the exposure, and the systems to turn that talent into opportunity.
“A child’s future should not depend on leaving their home,” Pierrot said. “There must be opportunity where they are.”
It was, he said, this conviction that led him to create the Frantzdy Pierrot Academy in Haiti — and the conviction that has now led him to formally launch the Frantzdy Pierrot Foundation. The Foundation, he explained, will function as an umbrella organization connecting different youth academies and football clubs across Haiti, helping thousands of children play the game while building structured pathways to scouts, academies, and tryouts in Europe, North America, and South America.
“We cannot wait another 52 years to show the world,” Pierrot said.
The announcement drew sustained applause. For many in the room, Haitian-American parents, community organizers, and current youth coaches, the Foundation represents exactly the kind of long-term, structural investment in Haiti that the community has been calling for.
A Coach’s Tribute
The afternoon closed with remarks from one of Pierrot’s longtime mentors and coaches, who took the stage at the Governor’s invitation. The coach, who spoke with visible emotion, described having begun working with Pierrot nearly fifteen years ago, when Pierrot was a young multi-sport athlete still figuring out his path.
Originally from Jamaica, the coach described the decision he and Pierrot had made together to commit fully to soccer rather than basketball — a decision he said reflected Pierrot’s own belief that he could become a professional. He described watching Pierrot rise through the ranks of European football, including a moment at a Champions League match when his biological son turned to him and said: “Dad, you did the right thing.”
The coach said he had thought of himself as Pierrot’s coach for many years — but had come to see, he said, that Pierrot was now coaching him.
Looking Ahead to June 13
The State House event concluded with a reception, with additional celebrations planned the following day in Randolph, one of the Massachusetts municipalities with the densest Haitian population.
For Pierrot, the State House celebration marked a brief pause in what has been an extraordinary year. He returns to Haitian national team duty shortly as the squad enters its final preparation period before its opening match against Scotland on June 13 at Gillette Stadium. Haiti will face Brazil on June 19 and Morocco on June 24 in its remaining group stage fixtures.
For the community in Massachusetts, the celebration on Tuesday felt like a beginning rather than an end. The Frantzdy Pierrot Foundation will continue its work in Haiti regardless of how the World Cup unfolds. The proclamations issued by the Governor and the Boston City Council President will remain on the official record. And the gathering at the State House — bringing together five decades of Haitian community history in a single room — will be remembered as the moment Massachusetts officially recognized one of its own.
Caribbean Television Network covered the Frantzdy Pierrot Day proclamation ceremony at the Massachusetts State House on Tuesday, May 26, 2026.
CTN is a multilingual digital news organization serving the Haitian diaspora and broader Caribbean community across the United States. CTN holds FIFA media accreditation for the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
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This article was originally written in English. Versions in other languages, including French and Haitian Creole, are made available through AI translation software. Errors and inaccuracies may be present in translated versions. Only the English version should be considered the authoritative record.
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