diff --git a/controllers/imageupdateautomation_controller.go b/controllers/imageupdateautomation_controller.go
index 6b0896db..b3d4a6ba 100644
--- a/controllers/imageupdateautomation_controller.go
+++ b/controllers/imageupdateautomation_controller.go
@@ -509,8 +509,8 @@ func commitChangedManifests(repo *gogit.Repository, absRepoPath string, ent *ope
 
 	// go-git has [a bug](https://github.com/go-git/go-git/issues/253)
 	// whereby it thinks broken symlinks to absolute paths are
-	// modified; and, there's no circumstance in which we want to
-	// commit a change to a broken symlink: so, skip those.
+	// modified. There's no circumstance in which we want to commit a
+	// change to a broken symlink: so, detect and skip those.
 	var changed bool
 	for file, _ := range status {
 		abspath := filepath.Join(absRepoPath, file)
@@ -520,13 +520,10 @@ func commitChangedManifests(repo *gogit.Repository, absRepoPath string, ent *ope
 		}
 		if info.Mode()&os.ModeSymlink > 0 {
 			// symlinks are OK; broken symlinks are probably a result
-			// of the bug mentioned above, but not of interest anyway.
-			if _, err := os.Readlink(abspath); err != nil {
-				return "", fmt.Errorf("problem reading symlink: %w", err)
-			} else {
-				if _, err := os.Stat(abspath); os.IsNotExist(err) {
-					continue
-				}
+			// of the bug mentioned above, but not of interest in any
+			// case.
+			if _, err := os.Stat(abspath); os.IsNotExist(err) {
+				continue
 			}
 		}
 		working.Add(file)