Dr. Chee Soon Juan is the Secretary-General of the Singapore Democratic Party (SDP). Chee is a neuropsychologist and received his Ph.D. from the University of Georgia in 1990. He joined SDP in 1992 and became the Secretary-General of SDP, replacing founder Chiam See Tong who left to join the Singapore People's Party. Chee has been convicted and imprisoned several times. Chee lost a defamation lawsuit filed by PAP leaders in 2001. Chee was declared bankrupt in 2006 when he failed to pay the damages. He was in jail for contempt of court. He has since been released. Chee was Honorary Research Associate at the Monash Asia Institute in 1997 and at the University of Chicago in 2001. In 2004, he participated in the Reagan-Fascell Democracy Program at the National Endowment for Democracy in Washington, D.C.. He is the Chairman of the Alliance for Reform & Democracy in Asia, and was a Reagan-Fascell Democracy Fellow at the Washington-based National Endowment for Democracy (2004).