Bruce Korb pointed out that ncftpput is far from universal.
Maybe a patch like this?
--- /tmp/gnupload 2009-12-14 00:24:38.000000000 -0800
+++ /u/karl/bin/gnupload 2009-12-14 16:28:26.000000000 -0800
@@ -97,4 +97,9 @@
-- foobar-0.9.91.tar.gz
+gnupload uses the ncftpput program to do the transfers; if you don't
+happen to have an ncftp package installed, the ncftpput-ftp script in
+the build-aux/ directory of the gnulib package
+(http://savannah.gnu.org/projects/gnulib) may serve as a replacement.
+
Report bugs to <bug-autom...@gnu.org>.
Send patches to <automake-patches@gnu.org>."
