The Uganda development target of increasing private sector investment and reduce mass poverty, which has recently been reaffirmed, contrasts sharply with experience on the ground, where investors are confronted with a combination of obstacles ranging from restrictive government regulation and lack of respect for property rights to corruption and poor macroeconomic environment. Competition places pressure on the firms to cut costs, yet many of the costs such as costs associated with corruption, bureaucracy, infrastructure deficiency, transport and telecommunication, utility tariffs, tax regime, interest rates, etc are not in the control of the firms. This highly constrains business growth. Where taxes and bureaucracy are inhibitory to business survival others try to cope by going under or pay bribes in order to avoid making full payment of tax and utility bills, or to avoid losing out on business opportunity due to excessive delays. This study, conducted under the auspicious of the Anti Corruption Coalition Uganda, attempted to analyse the impact of corruption on private businesses, using a number of case studies. Using a data set for 100 firms interviewed in September 2002 – comprising manufacturers (textile, and beverages/soft drinks); exporters (coffee traders and processors,