A group of over 20 mayors from major cities from across Japan is planning next month to organize in central Osaka a canvassing event against Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto's plan to create an Osaka Metropolitan Government, local press reported on Friday.

The activity was proposed by Osami Takeyama, the mayor of Sakai City in southern Osaka Prefecture, to express opposition against Hashimoto's proposal to create a single "Osaka metropolis," the daily Asahi Shimbun reported.

The call was echoed by other municipal government leaders in the prefecture and its surrounding Kansai region, including Kobe Mayor Tatsuo Yada.

The report said that Takeyama will make a speech with other mayors on a square near Namba Station in the center of Osaka City next week to let more people know difficulties and negative aspects of the radical metropolis plan, adding that the event is arranged ahead of next month's mayoral election of Sakai City for which the incumbent mayor Takeyama will again run.

Hashimoto's Osaka metropolis plan is aimed at demolishing the city governments of Osaka and Sakai, and establishing in Osaka a local administrative structure similar to that of Tokyo, the national capital of Japan.