Why does Haiti, a country of African descent, have an indigenous name?
Before the formation of Haiti, the French colony of Saint Domingue, there were no Tainos, only mestizos. There were Indians brought by the French from Louisiana, Canada, South America and Asian Indians sent through the Isle of France (present Mauritius), who represented a very small percentage of the population.
With the triumph of the Haitian revolution, Dessalines and his officials were looking for a name for their new nation, but they needed one that would unify all the blacks of different origins, so they opted for the old Taino name that the island had. As the Indians were seen as a symbol of resistance against the Europeans, Dessalines named his Inca troops thus, although he later called them Armée indigène, the only indigenous thing they had was their name.
It is believed that they chose this name because the mestizo elite rejected both African culture and European rule. Moreover, this would defend the Haitians as successors of the Tainos, which is not true.