diff --git a/libselinux/Makefile b/libselinux/Makefile
index 439bc6a9..6d9e2736 100644
--- a/libselinux/Makefile
+++ b/libselinux/Makefile
@@ -23,7 +23,7 @@ ifeq ($(DISABLE_X11),y)
 endif
 export DISABLE_SETRANS DISABLE_RPM DISABLE_FLAGS ANDROID_HOST DISABLE_X11 LABEL_BACKEND_ANDROID
 
-USE_PCRE2 ?= n
+USE_PCRE2 ?= y
 ifeq ($(USE_PCRE2),y)
 	PCRE_MODULE := libpcre2-8
 	PCRE_CFLAGS := -DUSE_PCRE2 -DPCRE2_CODE_UNIT_WIDTH=8
diff --git a/libselinux/src/Makefile b/libselinux/src/Makefile
index 52c40f01..04bf4f24 100644
--- a/libselinux/src/Makefile
+++ b/libselinux/src/Makefile
@@ -98,7 +98,6 @@ override LDFLAGS += -L/opt/local/lib -undefined dynamic_lookup
 LD_SONAME_FLAGS=-install_name,$(LIBSO)
 endif
 
-PCRE_LDLIBS ?= -lpcre
 # override with -lfts when building on Musl libc to use fts-standalone
 FTS_LDLIBS ?=
 
diff --git a/libselinux/utils/Makefile b/libselinux/utils/Makefile
index 36816155..801066cb 100644
--- a/libselinux/utils/Makefile
+++ b/libselinux/utils/Makefile
@@ -44,7 +44,6 @@ endif
 override CFLAGS += -I../include -D_GNU_SOURCE $(DISABLE_FLAGS) $(PCRE_CFLAGS)
 override LDFLAGS += -L../src
 override LDLIBS += -lselinux $(FTS_LDLIBS)
-PCRE_LDLIBS ?= -lpcre
 
 ifeq ($(ANDROID_HOST),y)
 TARGETS=sefcontext_compile