Khoka, also the president of BNP Dhaka City unit, said he will not participate in any parliamentary or city corporation elections in future. He, however, said he would be active in party politics.

While talking about the appointment of BNP chief Khaleda Zia's brother Major (retd) Sayeed Iskandar as party vice-chairman, Khoka said time has come to reduce the unilateral power of the party chairperson.

"Such unilateral power was necessary when the party was formed, but now it is a mature party," he said.

"Decentralisation of power is necessary in BNP to make it a pro-people party," he told private satellite television channel ATN Bangla last night.

The politicians are responsible for the present situation in the country, Khoka said, adding that he thinks the BNP leadership cannot shrug off the blame.

Referring to the extension of the judges' retirement age, he said the BNP leaders failed to foresee the consequences of the decision that created the scope to make Justice KM Hasan the chief adviser.

"That was the beginning of the crisis," he said, adding that although there were series of discussions to resolve the crisis, they missed the opportunities.

Referring to the meetings between Awami League General Secretary Abdul Jalil and BNP Secretary General Abdul Mannan Bhuiyan, Khoka said it seemed to him that many BNP leaders were not interested in seeing any positive results from those meetings.

"I think we tried to influence the caretaker government of President Iajuddin Ahmed," said Khoka, who will complete his five-year term as Dhaka mayor on May 14.

There were efforts to keep the Iajuddin-led government far from neutrality so that it could not perform properly, Khoka said.