Drop as in just remove the dependency without doing anything else? Do I undestand this correctly?

(In reply to Jan Synacek from comment #1)
> Drop as in just remove the dependency without doing anything else? Do I
> undestand this correctly?

No:

(In reply to Lubomir Rintel from comment #0)
> The newer version of pidgin drops it altogether in favor of GNetworkMonitor.

Either update pidgin to a newer version, or

> Alternatively, you can patch the existing package with this:
> https://bitbucket.org/lkundrak/pidgin/commits/
> c69c0f65bed7fe79efcacb0f998bab44373e48b7?at=lr/libnm-2.12

apply the patch.

Sorry for the confusion.

Ok, thanks for the clarification. As a new version isn't out yet, I'm going to go with the patch.

Oh, oh. I didn't realize that it's unreleased, the upstream patches are over two years old now. If you'd prefer to go with the upstream patches instead, please look for these two in the upstream repository (the "first stab" suggests that there are perhaps some more):

Author: Gary Kramlich <grim>
Date:   Mon Dec 28 01:05:18 2015 -0600

    First stab at replacing network-manager with gio, this probably breaks win32, need to test and see

Author: Gary Kramlich <grim>
Date:   Sun Dec 27 23:43:49 2015 -0600

    Remove the network manager checks from configure.ac

Ok, so the relevant patch set seems to be this:

changeset:   37492:5a740d40503d
branch:      replace-nm-with-gio
parent:      37491:849d12200039
parent:      37484:78d036e70f8e
user:        Gary Kramlich <grim>
date:        Tue Dec 29 21:48:15 2015 -0600
summary:     Pulling default in again

changeset:   37491:849d12200039
branch:      replace-nm-with-gio
parent:      37490:027dd30d3572
parent:      37480:609d20c56162
user:        Gary Kramlich <grim>
date:        Mon Dec 28 21:56:53 2015 -0600
summary:     merging

changeset:   37490:027dd30d3572
branch:      replace-nm-with-gio
user:        Gary Kramlich <grim>
date:        Mon Dec 28 21:54:46 2015 -0600
summary:     ChangeLog the removal of the network-configuration-changed signal

changeset:   37489:cbf9ccc715ab
branch:      replace-nm-with-gio
user:        Gary Kramlich <grim>
date:        Mon Dec 28 21:20:03 2015 -0600
summary:     Move everything in libpurple that was using the network-changed signal to use the gio one

changeset:   37488:88afe246144e
branch:      replace-nm-with-gio
user:        Gary Kramlich <grim>
date:        Mon Dec 28 01:05:18 2015 -0600
summary:     First stab at replacing network-manager with gio, this probably breaks win32, need to test and see

changeset:   37487:d1c752a86448
branch:      replace-nm-with-gio
parent:      37475:643d7b0aadbd
user:        Gary Kramlich <grim>
date:        Sun Dec 27 23:43:49 2015 -0600
summary:     Remove the network manager checks from configure.ac


I'm inclined to wait for a release;)

This bug appears to have been reported against 'rawhide' during the Fedora 28 development cycle.
Changing version to '28'.

These whole patchset seem uneccesary…  Pidgin can use the dbus-backend to get changes on network-connections…  PR will follow…