realine not found error

[David Bear]

I built python 2.4.2 for suse linux 9.3. I configured it to be a separate
instance of python from the version packaged with suse.

Now when I start it I get an error:
python
Python 2.4.2 (#4, Jul 27 2006, 14:34:30)
[GCC 3.3.5 20050117 (prerelease) (SUSE Linux)] on linux2
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/etc/pythonstart", line 7, in ?
    import readline
ImportError: No module named readline

however, I do have readline installed:

rpm -qa | grep readline
readline-5.0-7.2
readline-32bit-9.3-7.1

it id truly does exist:

locate readline 
...
/lib/libreadline.so.5
/lib/libreadline.so.5.0
/lib64/libreadline.so.5
/lib64/libreadline.so.5.0
...

I googled about for this and there were numerous hits on this problem from
others, but I never found a 'solution'.

-- 
David Bear
-- let me buy your intellectual property, I want to own your thoughts --