After taking over as the SDP's secretary-general, Chee began regularly travelling abroad and to talk about his views on how "democracy is limited" in Singapore to the foreign media, especially in the Western countries. He also published his second political book, "Dare to Change: An Alternative Vision for Singapore". In 1994, in response to criticisms of the book made by then Deputy Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, Chee wrote a letter to "The Straits Times". The PAP's Second Organising Secretary, Matthias Yao, then wrote to the newspaper to reply to Chee's comments. This led to a two-month-long exchange of letters between Chee and Yao in the newspaper that ended with Chee issuing a challenge to Yao to stand against him in a single member constituency at the next general election. At Yao's request, Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong agreed to separate Yao's MacPherson ward from the rest of Marine Parade GRC at the next general election so that he could take up Chee's challenge. Chee lost the election, ganering only 34.86% of the vote to Yao's 65.14%.