problem connecting with libpq++ interface

Hi everybody,

I have a really strange problem . I'm trying to connect to PostgreSQL db
from witin my C++  program and using the libpq++ interface functions . But
strangely it won't connect and I'm receiving the following error message

connection to db failed.
 Error returned:ERROR: PQconnectdb() - Missing '=' after 'template1' in
conninfo

.here's my code
PGconn *conn1;
const char * dbname="template1";
PgDatabase data(dbname);
    conn1=PQconnectdb(dbname);
    if (data.ConnectionBad())
    {
        cerr<<" connection to db failed."<< endl
            <<" Error returned:" <<  data.ErrorMessage() << endl;
        exit(1);
    }


any idea would be appreciated. thanks in advance!
deniz