High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Kojo Tovalou Houenou (born Marc Tovalou Quenum; 25 April 1887 – 13 July 1936) was a prominent African critic of the French colonial empire in Africa. Born in Porto-Novo (a French protectorate to become part of the colony of French Dahomey, present-day Benin, in 1894) to a wealthy father and a mother related to the king of the Kingdom of Dahomey. He was sent to France for education at the age of 13, received a law degree, medical training, and served in the French armed forces as an army doctor during World War I. Following the war, Houenou became a minor celebrity in Paris, dating actresses, writing books as a public intellectual, and making connections with many of the elite of French society. In 1921, he visited Dahomey for the first time since 1900 and upon returning to France became active in trying to build bonds between the France and Dahomey. In 1923, he was assaulted in a French nightclub by Americans who objected to an African being...