With no job connections, graduates sweat for work

In the last 10 years, a number of recruitment agencies have been cropping up to fill the employment gap affecting especially fresh graduates. They have also been sparing job seekers the trouble of walking up and down with academic transcripts as they look for vacancies.

And a few years ago, the government established the Public Service Recruitment Secretariat under the President’s Office, which among other things facilitates recruitment in ministries, independent departments, executive agencies and other public institutions.

But every year, more than 30,000 graduates from both public and private universities who hope to find recruitment agencies handy in their job searches, more often than not, end up frustrated because to get a foot in the door, many job seekers get help from someone they know.

It is not about merit. A good number of graduates end up working with a relative who gave them the role, or in a position which a family member helped them secure. For these privileged few it is a boost, but it is a boot in the stomach for those without connections.

“In most cases it is more of a question of who you than what you have to offer that matters,” says Abdallah Possi, a lawyer and academician with the University of Dodoma (Udom).

Job seeking graduates say deeply flawed recruitment processes in many companies mean no job for anyone with no connections, especially for vacancies that attract hundreds, if not thousands of application letters.

Nepotism

Reports of nepotism are not new, and they normally come and go without much attention but according to hiring experts and some job seekers, who spoke to Success, the vice has now become deeply-ingrained in the labour market as government struggles to keep unemployment in check.

The rate of unemployment hovers around 11 per cent, according to official statistics from the National Bureau of Statistics.

While nepotism is hardly a new concept in Tanzania, it is still disheartening for the majority of graduates who were not lucky enough to have been created in a womb with privileged ties.

This unfair advantage is especially insulting during a time in which an oversupply of university graduates and bleak job prospects is creating a struggle for the young and educated in the country.

Those who are mostly affected are fresh graduates, who lack the experience and ‘connections’ that have become increasingly two major factors for easily landing a job.

Which brings one to the question: Is it nepotism or networking? Some would argue that it is not old-boy networking, it’s just about getting in front of someone who works in the relevant industry and being remembered by them for when the right opportunity arises. It’s what mid- career people do all the time to progress in their careers.

Legal experts argue that nepotism is against the law, though nobody pays attention to such cases, unless it’s a question raised as an abuse of office case in the public sector.

But the problem, Mr Possi explains, is that Tanzania lacks a clear-cut and binding human resource policy that applies equally to both the pubic and private sector.

“It is commonplace for even some public institutions to place a job vacancy in the newspaper as a formality after a position has already been occupied,” says the lawyer.

He adds that a clear regulation will put in place recruitment do’s and don’ts that offer guidelines on the hiring processes, and cushion young graduates against HR misconduct. “It will also save the face of the human resources profession by making sure that job seekers restore confidence in the hiring processes,” he says.

Currently, there is no binding regulation that makes it mandatory for firms to explain why they have not hired a particular job seeker, even in clear cases of discrimination.

A human resources manager with CSI Limited, Mr Alex Nyambui, says although most companies have HR policies, which function as holy books, hiring processes rarely reflect the contents of the rule books.

“It is unfortunate that many people involved in the recruitment process are bigger than the law, and at the end of the day, vices like nepotism and favouritism win,” he says in an interview with Success.

The HR manager argues that while many people would want to believe that nepotism is rife in the private sector, it is within public entities that the vice has a tendency to rear its ugly head the most.

“This is typical practice in government institutions. There are cases of senior officials writing memos today and the next day their relative or close friend acquires a job,” he says.

In recent years, scams revealed skeletons in the drawers of senior officials at major public financial institutions, as it emerged that many of the workers behind the scandals were relatives of influential politicians.

For Meg Muigai, a media consultant based in Dar es Salaam, getting a job took more time than she had anticipated, although she felt she had the qualifications and experience.

“One of the things I have come to know is that not every job vacancy you come across in newspapers is genuine. Some of the adverts are mere formalities aimed at saving the face of nepotistic elements within companies,” she says.

She recalls the countless interviews she attended before landing her current job. “Some times you do an interview with people, who are less qualified than you, but you will not get the job, and they do,” she says.

Zakia Amrani, a second year law student at Mzumbe University in Morogoro, says it has also become tough to find a place for internship if you are not well connected.

“When we started looking for internship it became more real than apparent that nepotism is at work. I was in the company of a college mate who was fortunate enough to be related to the manager of a certain firm. He got it and I didn’t, and there was no justification for picking him,” she says.