ldap database directory permission denied

Hello, I have a problem to run openldap in a different directory other than /var/lib/ldap I am using Redhat AS 4 (update 4) with selinux disabled. Openldap version is 2.4.13 . The message written into syslog is "line 24: invalid path: Permission denied " . Line 24 specifies is a different directory than /var/lib/ldap and directory has the 755 permission of the user running ldap daemon. Google search has revealed some issues on ubuntu and on redhat with selinux enabled but I have neither of these. If I change the directory to /var/lib/ldap everything works fine. I hope someone could shed me light on this issue.

thanks a lot.