diff --git a/layers/wr-base/recipes-devtools/dpkg/dpkg_1.15.8.7.bbappend b/layers/wr-base/recipes-devtools/dpkg/dpkg_1.15.8.7.bbappend
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..a7a0d13
--- /dev/null
+++ b/layers/wr-base/recipes-devtools/dpkg/dpkg_1.15.8.7.bbappend
@@ -0,0 +1,5 @@
+PRINC = "1"
+
+FILESEXTRAPATHS_prepend := "${THISDIR}/files"
+
+SRC_URI += "file://no-vla-warning.patch"
diff --git a/layers/wr-base/recipes-devtools/dpkg/files/no-vla-warning.patch b/layers/wr-base/recipes-devtools/dpkg/files/no-vla-warning.patch
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..2cfdaaf
--- /dev/null
+++ b/layers/wr-base/recipes-devtools/dpkg/files/no-vla-warning.patch
@@ -0,0 +1,22 @@
+Remove the -Wvla flag from the set of compiler warning flags, since gcc
+on ancient host systems such as CentOS 5.8 doesn't support it, and it
+causes a build error for dpkg-native.
+
+Upstream-Status: Inappropriate [everyone else builds on newer hosts :-)]
+
+Signed-off-by: Donn Seeley <donn.seeley@windriver.com>
+---
+ m4/dpkg-compiler.m4 |    2 +-
+ 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)
+
+--- a/m4/dpkg-compiler.m4
++++ b/m4/dpkg-compiler.m4
+@@ -13,7 +13,7 @@ AC_DEFUN([DPKG_COMPILER_WARNINGS],
+ 
+ WFLAGS="-Wall -Wextra -Wno-unused-parameter -Wno-missing-field-initializers \
+ 	 -Wmissing-declarations -Wmissing-format-attribute \
+-	 -Wvla -Winit-self -Wwrite-strings -Wcast-align -Wshadow"
++	 -Winit-self -Wwrite-strings -Wcast-align -Wshadow"
+ WCFLAGS="-Wdeclaration-after-statement -Wnested-externs -Wbad-function-cast \
+ 	 -Wstrict-prototypes -Wmissing-prototypes -Wold-style-definition"
+ # Temporarily here until #542031 gets fixed in ncurses