Paul Bijnens wrote:

Leonid Shulov wrote:

Now /var/log/amanda:
drwx--S---  2 backup backup    1024 2006-01-23 12:50 amanda/

It is still confusing what you write:  Is that the contents of
/var/log/amanda or the directory itself?
I.e is there a directory /var/log/amanda/amanda that has those
permissions? or is it /var/log/amanda itself?

it is /var/log/amanda

but:
astp0002:/var/log# sudo -u backup /usr/lib/amanda/amandad
amandad: create debug directory "/var/log/amanda": Permission denied

Or do you have SElinux enabled with some very strict setting?

No, simple Debian Linux with kernel 2.6.15-1-686