diff --git a/mcs/mcs/ChangeLog b/mcs/mcs/ChangeLog
index abbef7e936cee..1add5c82995e9 100755
--- a/mcs/mcs/ChangeLog
+++ b/mcs/mcs/ChangeLog
@@ -1,3 +1,7 @@
+2001-09-17  Miguel de Icaza  <miguel@ximian.com>
+
+	* rootcontext.cs: Fix bug: tree.Namespaces might be null.
+
 2001-09-16  Ravi Pratap  <ravi@ximian.com>
 
 	* class.cs (EmitStaticFieldInitializers, EmitFieldInitializers): Make public.
diff --git a/mcs/mcs/rootcontext.cs b/mcs/mcs/rootcontext.cs
index a2e312730a7b3..5df8ec14e5838 100755
--- a/mcs/mcs/rootcontext.cs
+++ b/mcs/mcs/rootcontext.cs
@@ -565,13 +565,18 @@ public Type LookupType (TypeContainer tc, string name)
 
 		public bool IsNamespace (string name)
 		{
-			Namespace ns = (Namespace) tree.Namespaces [name];
+			Namespace ns;
 
-			if (ns != null)
-				return true;
-			else
-				return false;
-			
+			if (tree.Namespaces){
+				ns = (Namespace) tree.Namespaces [name];
+
+				if (ns != null)
+					return true;
+				else
+					return false;
+			}
+
+			return false;
 		}
 		
 		// <summary>