ora-01979 on password protected role after upgrade from 11g to 12c

Hi,

After upgrading an Oracle 11.2.0.4 database to 12.2.0.1 we get ora-01979 (password for role is missing or invalid). On 11g this didn't happen.I did check the sys.user$ table and only the password column is populated for the role. Spare4 is empty. I did try an alter role <rolename> identified by values 'xxxxxx';  and even a drop/create role. As we don't know the unencrypted password we have to use by values. But the ora-01979. I think the role was created on a pre-11g database (probably10g).

I did search on Metalink for issues with password protected role after an upgrade from 11g to 12c but could not find antything relevant. A google hit was this one: