The Osaka Municipal Government will seek to sell its shares of Kansai Electric Power Co. to comply with a policy calling for less reliance on investment income, the city said in a statement.
The sale by the city, whose 9.37 percent stake makes it the utility's biggest shareholder, was decided at a strategy meeting Monday attended by Mayor Toru Hashimoto, according to Treasury Department official Takashi Yamaguchi.
The move will make good on Hashimoto's pledge to rid the city of its holding in Kansai Electric should the utility ignore calls to stop using atomic power. Kansai Electric, which serves 13.5 million customers, applied in July 2013 for safety checks needed before operations at its Oi nuclear plant in Fukui Prefecture can resume.
The Oi reactors, which were idled in September 2013, are about 95 km from Osaka and about 35 km from Lake Biwa, which supplies the city and other municipalities in the populous Kansai region with drinking water.
The sale proposal will be presented Nov. 21 to the Osaka Municipal Assembly, which will hold a vote Dec. 9, Yamaguchi said. Other details, including the sale's timing, were not decided, he said.
Kansai Electric said in a statement on its website that it is not in a position to comment on the sale of its shares. The company will make efforts to improve shareholder value, it said.
The decision was prompted by a clarification of the city's funding strategy that was also adopted during Monday's meeting, according to the statement.
Kansai Electric is among the city's investments being sold because it did not pay a dividend last fiscal year, according to the statement, which also said private investors will be better equipped to guide the company's decisions.
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