Problems embedding python (undefined symbol: stat)

[obscurity]

I'm trying to embed python in a C++ app I'm writing (on linux). All I've
added so far is a call to Py_Initialize, and when I run my app it dies
somewhere in Py_Initialize with "undefined symbol: stat". Isn't stat a
standard libc call?  If so, how the hell can it be undefined?  I'm coming to
the conclusion that my python installation is broken in some way, but it was
a simply ./comfigure;make;make install job, so I haven't done anything
strange with it.

Can anyone offer an advice in fixing this?

-- 
obscurity.

"Only the great masters of style ever succeed in being obscure." - Oscar Wilde