Strange problem with X

When transferred a Gobo-installation to another machine, I met a strange
problem: the X-Window won't start anymore, complaining:

  (EE) XKB: Couldn't compile keymap
  XKB: Failed to compile keymap
  Keyboard initialization failed. This could be a missing or incorrect setup
  of xkeyboard-config.

The strange thing about this is that the same system (I made a copy) works
without any problems on different machine; but even on the troublesome one
it's working as long, as I'm starting X as root - then it must be something
permission-related.

Googling around, found some tips, like this one:

http://archive.linuxfromscratch.org/mail-archives/blfs-support/2011-February/068215.html

...but I haven't got any /var/lib/xkb in the system, and - as I wrote - it's
working in case of root user (and as any user on the other machine).

Any clues, what should be checked in case of Gobo installation?
-- 
regards,
Zbigniew