diff --git a/package/tibit/dpkg/dpkg.conf b/package/tibit/dpkg/dpkg.conf
index 62c7e653b..dec451372 100644
--- a/package/tibit/dpkg/dpkg.conf
+++ b/package/tibit/dpkg/dpkg.conf
@@ -23,3 +23,6 @@
 
 confopt="$confopt --without-sgml-doc --without-start-stop-daemon"
 
+# the following is needed to link against a static ncurses library
+# that dynamically links to libgpm
+var_append configprefix " " "CURSES_LIBS=\"\$CURSES_LIBS -ldl\""