Okay - I added the debug. Now this is interesting. The arguments passed to ld are not valid with the current AIX linker installed on my system.

... any thoughts on how to fix? Do I need to manually build an ld command and replace it in the Makfile.PL? (that feels wrong)

# /admin/perl5_64/bin/perl Makefile.PL LIBS='-L/usr/lib -L/usr/local/l
+ib -lghttp' INC='-I/usr/include -I/usr/local/include' DEBUG=1
running gnome-config... ok
checking for main() in -lghttp... ld -o conftest -D_ALL_SOURCE -D_ANSI
+_C_SOURCE -D_POSIX_SOURCE -qmaxmem=-1 -qnoansialias -qlanglvl=extc99 
+-DUSE_NATIVE_DLOPEN -DNEED_PTHREAD_INIT -q64 -DUSE_64_BIT_ALL -q64 -I
+ -I/usr/include -I/usr/local/include -brtl -bdynamic -b64 conftest.c 
+-lpthread -lbind -lnsl -ldbm -ldb -ldl -lld -lm -lcrypt -lpthreads -l
+c -L/usr/lib -L/usr/local/lib -lghttp -lghttp
ld: 0706-029 Use a number with the -D flag.
ld: 0706-029 Use a number with the -D flag.
ld: 0706-029 Use a number with the -D flag.
ld: 0706-012 The -q flag is not recognized.
ld: 0706-012 The -a flag is not recognized.
ld: 0706-027 The -x flag is ignored.
ld: 0706-012 The -q flag is not recognized.
ld: 0706-027 The -n flag is ignored.
ld: 0706-012 The -q flag is not recognized.
ld: 0706-029 Use a number with the -D flag.
ld: 0706-029 Use a number with the -D flag.
ld: 0706-012 The -q flag is not recognized.
ld: 0706-012 The -6 flag is not recognized.
ld: 0706-012 The -4 flag is not recognized.
ld: 0706-029 Use a number with the -D flag.
ld: 0706-012 The -q flag is not recognized.
ld: 0706-012 The -6 flag is not recognized.
ld: 0706-012 The -4 flag is not recognized.
ld: 0706-012 The -I flag is not recognized.
ld: 0706-012 The -I flag is not recognized.
ld: 0706-012 The -/ flag is not recognized.
ld: 0706-012 The -I flag is not recognized.
ld: 0706-012 The -/ flag is not recognized.
ld: 0706-006 Cannot find or open library file: -l anglvl=extc99
        ld:open(): No such file or directory
system call to 'ld -o conftest -D_ALL_SOURCE -D_ANSI_C_SOURCE -D_POSIX
+_SOURCE -qmaxmem=-1 -qnoansialias -qlanglvl=extc99 -DUSE_NATIVE_DLOPE
+N -DNEED_PTHREAD_INIT -q64 -DUSE_64_BIT_ALL -q64 -I -I/usr/include -I
+/usr/local/include -brtl -bdynamic -b64 conftest.c -lpthread -lbind -
+lnsl -ldbm -ldb -ldl -lld -lm -lcrypt -lpthreads -lc -L/usr/lib -L/us
+r/local/lib -lghttp -lghttp' failed at Makefile.PL line 92.
no
libghttp not found
Try setting LIBS and INC values on the command line
Or get libghttp from
  ftp://ftp.gnome.org/pub/GNOME/stable/sources/libghttp/
[download]

For the The *** flag is not recognized errors, try to minimize the optimization flags you are using, so one more problem is if you are using the -shared flag, this flag is not need if you use the -G flag to make the shared library.

It also looks like hes not using gcc -- gcc seems to make life easier as its more tested than whatever aix compiler OPs using