Comment # 40 on bug 1226122 from Mario Guzman

In response to @Martin Wilck:
@Mario, I reckon you didn't install systemd-boot and/or sdbootutil on the
failing system? Do you have shim installed? I reckon /boot/efi did not exist on
your system?

No systemd-boot
No sdbootutil
No shim
No /boot/efi directory in any linux, although there is an efi partition:

I have an efi partition on the internal and external SSDs. Can boot from either
using the Option key at startup (mac feature). They ONLY contain REFIND, and
REFIND PLUS which provides a fantastic multiboot system that currently boots:
* 4 Tumbleweed BTRFS partitions (for Virtualbox VM etc.)
* Elementary OS (linux)
* linux utility partition
* 4 macOS partitions (for FreeSwitch development, I wrote the macOS wiki)
* I have tested other linux distros for years using this layout.

None of these systems are allowed to put anything into the EFI partition nor
have a need to access an EFI.

Thank you all, and Felix for the RPM command which provided me a starting point
to find the problem.