Strange issue with gitolite on Ubuntu (on Debian no problem...)

[sbadia]

root@gitlab:/srv/vagrant-puppet/manifests# ssh -i gitlab_testing.priv git@localhost
PTY allocation request failed on channel 0

***** ABORTING *****
open /etc/gitolite/VERSION failed: No such file or directory at /usr/share/gitolite/gitolite.pm line 124
Connection to localhost closed.

root@gitlab:/srv/vagrant-puppet/manifests# mkdir /etc/gitolite
root@gitlab:/srv/vagrant-puppet/manifests# echo '42' > /etc/gitolite/VERSION
root@gitlab:/srv/vagrant-puppet/manifests# ssh -i gitlab_testing.priv git@localhost
PTY allocation request failed on channel 0
hello admin, this is gitolite 42 running on git 1.7.9.5
the gitolite config gives you the following access:
R W gitolite-admin
@R_ @W_ testing
Connection to localhost closed.