TO ALL RESEARCHERS

HOW CAN YOUNG RESEARCHERS GET ACCURATE DATA?

Why Young Researchers come up with insufficient, or cooked data?

By Adam Ngamba

There are claims that often emerge regarding to young Researchers in developing countries mainly here in Tanzania that our researchers do not collect enough data when it comes to the issue of dissertation and other assignments which need collection of information.

This problem has been prevailing now and then especially among young researchers who work hard looking for experience and those who conduct research as their partial fulfillment for their degrees or accomplishing certain programs as well.

As long as these young researchers show increasing need for certain valuable information for their projects, they experience some difficulties  from other individuals and in various institutions.

Unfortunately, these difficulties are not only found in small size institutions but also even in big and very important ones and sometimes even those which deal with the same research activities. This happens in both public and private offices.

 It is difficult to understand what bring about such situation into many places. Is it due to laziness, ignorance and lower thinking capacity, or abnormal behaviour of some people, misconception, or the nature of the given society?

The most terrifying thing is that these happen even in bigger and higher learning institutions, like universities, colleges and different schools which we do consider to be most helpful to people in these academic matters.

Actually, there is no development without the work of researchers, because researchers are the one who inspire changes. In order to investigate problems, people should conduct researches which may reveal how the whole issue and how  can be solved for, development to be achieved easily.

 As for, we journalists, we believe that “NO RESEARCH NO RIGHT TO SPEAK” so how can we be able to speak if  all people and various officers from whom we need information from them will not be ready to participate in providing such information?

ACTUALLY, this happened tome once or twice by the time I conducted certain project.When distributing questionnaires people  received them with great joy. But  Problems arose by the time for data collection, whereby nearly half of the respondents had not completed  filling  many questions, some of them did not attempt even a single questionnaire whilst others kept on promising;” We will fill them don’t worry.”

Let us think of this, is it fair for these big and respected institutions to keep on promising young researchers day by day?

Keeping on saying; ‘come tomorrow, then tomorrow while others failing even to read the questions and  some individuals keep on complaining  that their bosses were not present for and so  they failed to submit the task to the respected persons. I do not know whether the bosses do nowadays move with their offices wherever they go. 

These are our intellectuals; some are research experts, heading huge research institutions here in Tanzania while they fail to provide information to their young researchers in spite of knowing the significances of the research projects in the world.

It is wonderful! Wonderful indeed, how comes the researchers deny other researchers the opportunity to do research; they reject to give information and share experiences for bringing development. How will these young researchers gain experience and like going to the field to search for data, if at all the experts are not ready to provide valuable information required for certain project?

 By the end of the project I came to realize that, that is why people from developed nations do sometimes doubt our findings simply because of this tendency that has been implanted in many individuals in Tanzania and other parts of East Africa. Because they fear that may be these researchers, after having a lot of setbacks, can even decide to cook data in order only to accomplish the project in time.

This conclusion came about after my research leader who went to collect data in Burundi and Rwanda, encounted some difficulties in Burundi, as not even a single questionnaire was attempted.

Come on! Africa, is it because of only being black, ignorant, poor or leading serious less?