Chee Soon Juan

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Chee Soon Juan (simplified Chinese: 徐顺全; traditional Chinese: 徐順全; pinyin: Xú Shùnquán, born 20 July 1962) is a Singaporean politician and political activist. He is currently the leader of the Singapore Democratic Party (SDP).

A controversial political figure, Chee has been arrested and jailed several times for his political activities, mainly for repeatedly breaking Singapore's laws requiring organisers to obtain a police permit before staging political demonstrations or making public speeches on political issues. He has also been sued for defamation on multiple occasions as a result of comments he has made about members of Singapore's governing People's Action Party (PAP). He was previously barred from standing in parliamentary elections because he was declared bankrupt in 2006 after failing to pay damages from a lawsuit owed to two former Singaporean prime ministers, Lee Kuan Yew and Goh Chok Tong. However, on 24 September 2012, Chee announced that he had raised the sum of S$30,000 needed to pay Lee and Goh. His bankruptcy has been annulled, paving the way for him to contest the 2015 general election.

Chee joined the SDP in 1992, and became its Secretary-General following the resignation of the party's founder, Chiam See Tong (with whom Chee and the rest of the party's leadership have had a number of disagreements). The party had three Members of Parliament (MPs) at the time Chee took over as Secretary-General, but was reduced to no MPs at the 1997 general election and has not had any of its members elected to Parliament since then.

Chee is the Chairman of the Asian Alliance for Reforms and Democracy. He was a recipient of Parliamentarians for Global Action's "Defender of Democracy" award in 2003 as well as Liberal International's "Prize for Freedom" award in 2011.

Prior to entering politics, Chee was a psychology lecturer at the National University of Singapore (NUS). However, he was dismissed from this position in 1993 after being accused of misappropriating research funds. He has since served as a research fellow at the Monash Asia Institute (1997), the University of Chicago (2001), and the Reagan-Fascell Democracy Program at the National Endowment for Democracy in Washington, D.C. (2004).

Works[edit]

  • Dare to Change: An Alternative Vision for Singapore (Singapore Democratic Party: 1994)
  • Singapore, My Home Too (1995)
  • To Be Free: Stories from Asia's Struggle Against Oppression (Monash Asia Institute: 1998)
  • Your Future, My Faith, Our Freedom: A Democratic Blueprint for Singapore (Singapore Open Centre: 2001)
  • The Power of Courage: Effecting Political Change in Singapore Through Nonviolence (2005)

External links[edit]

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