Africa has realized the need to strengthen its research capacity to meet the demands for development and economic prosperity. However, this effort must take place under a heavy pressure for financial, highly qualified human and other resources. Governments on the continent devote quite significant parts of their budget in higher education; but most of it goes to teaching. Under these circumstances, research is left with small allocations or to funding from international donors. SIDA (Swedish International Development Authority) is one of such donors which has been involved in funding Addis Ababa and Dar-Es- Salaam Universities in Ethiopia and Tanzania respectively. The purpose of this study was to explore the effectiveness of SIDA support in both universities in terms of research capacity building. A meta-analytical case study approach which used qualitative instruments was applied to collect data. Findings indicate that SIDA support in both institutions contributed to institutional capacity building in research and research training. Both institutions reported that productivity in research and the likelihood of the number of students graduating with research degrees as well as the number of graduate programs which enroll graduate students are expanding with SIDA support. Moreover, it was reported that Swedish support has helped to strengthen research management and infrastructure. The study also revealed that outstanding implementation issues obstructed the achievement of some of the anticipated outcomes of the agreements between SIDA and the universities. From these findings, it was implied that development aid makes contributions to solving problems faced by developing countries, but it is not a sufficient condition to bring total change.