Comment 3 for bug 1815496

I've checked the build-dependencies of gegl in Ubuntu, and none of them ship .la files. So it looks like some other library that you have built locally, which depends on freetype (gegl does not directly build-depend on freetype), has a .la file installed which references the now-removed libfreetype.la.

This sort of brittleness is exactly why we no longer ship .la files.

You should rebuild your other local library against the .la-less disco freetype, at which point this problem goes away and gegl should be buildable.

The .la file will not be readded to the package.