Comment # 1 on bug 1178476 from Ludwig Nussel

the conclusion was too quick. Seems to be something else:

tanana:~ # stat /var/foo 
  File: /var/foo
  Size: 10              Blocks: 0          IO Block: 4096   directory
Device: fe08h/65032d    Inode: 1074838825  Links: 2
Access: (0755/drwxr-xr-x)  Uid: (    0/    root)   Gid: (    0/    root)
Access: 2020-11-05 14:01:28.728823125 +0000
Modify: 2020-11-05 13:56:15.596420566 +0000
Change: 2020-11-05 13:58:32.836597079 +0000
 Birth: -
tanana:~ # uname -a
Linux tanana 5.3.18-lp152.33-default #1 SMP Wed Jul 22 06:32:33 UTC 2020
(e5a8383) i686 i686 i386 GNU/Linux
tanana:~ # grep foo /etc/permissions.local
/var/foo/                                               root:root         1777
tanana:~ # chkstat --set --system /var/foo/
Checking permissions and ownerships - using the permissions files
        /usr/share/permissions/permissions
        /usr/share/permissions/permissions.easy
        /etc/permissions.local
tanana:~ # strace chkstat --set --system /var/foo/ -v
[...]
openat(AT_FDCWD, "/", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC|O_PATH) = 3
fstat64(3, {st_mode=S_IFDIR|0755, st_size=4096, ...}) = 0
openat(3, "var", O_RDONLY|O_NONBLOCK|O_NOFOLLOW|O_CLOEXEC|O_PATH) = 4
close(3)                                = 0
fstat64(4, {st_mode=S_IFDIR|0755, st_size=149, ...}) = 0
close(4)                                = 0
exit_group(0)                           = ?
+++ exited with 0 +++