SEOUL –

Lotte Holdings Co. shareholders voted to leave Lotte Group Chairman Shin Dong-bin in his post of director of the holding company, Lotte Group said in a statement, rejecting a third bid by his brother to seize control of the family-run South Korean conglomerate amid a government probe into possible bribery and embezzlement.

Shareholders of the Tokyo-based Lotte unit rejected former Lotte Holdings Vice Chairman Shin Dong-joo's proposal to oust seven current directors of the board including Shin Dong-bin and Lotte Holdings President Takayuki Tsukuda. Shin Dong-joo, 62, intended to form a new board including himself at the company meeting Saturday, a Lotte Group spokesman, who cannot be named because of company policy, said.

The decision leaves his brother, Dong-bin, 61, at the helm of a retail-to-plastics empire dogged by a government probe that has prompted it to postpone a $4.5 billion initial public offering at its hotel unit, and to scrap a major acquisition by its chemicals arm.

Shin Dong-bin's victory in the Japan vote Saturday is key because of Lotte Holdings' shares in other affiliates in the group, which has 89 Korean units with more than 100 trillion won (about $84.62 billion) in assets.

Shin Dong-joo will keep fighting "to normalize" the business of Lotte Group and to seek to oust current directors of the board including Dong-bin, SDJ Corp., which represents the older brother, said Saturday in an emailed statement.

Lotte's identity as a Korean company founded in Japan has also divided the family, with Dong-joo insisting that it is the wish of his father, Shin Kyuk-ho, to consolidate control of the company within Korea. Kyuk-ho, 93, founded Lotte in Japan in 1948 as a maker of chewing gum and sweets. Dong-joo had previously been in charge of the Japanese side of the business, while Dong-bin had control of the group in Korea. Dong-joo was ousted in January 2015, setting the stage for his attempts to mount a comeback he claims has their father's blessing.

Dong-bin, who has an MBA from Columbia University in New York and a bachelor's from Tokyo's Aoyama Gakuin University, last week vowed to complete the IPO of its hotel unit this year. Dong-joo, also an Aoyama Gakuin graduate, has an MBA from the Fu Foundation School of Engineering, and speaks Japanese better than the Korean language.

Shin Kyuk-ho in March lost his board seats at Hotel Lotte Co. and Lotte Confectionary Co. as attempts by Dong-joo to push his younger brother out backfired.

Lotte Group's businesses include South Korea's largest department store chain, luxury hotels and the Lotte World Adventure theme park.