Ubuntu 16.10 on amd64 comes with gcc 6.2 with PIE (position independent executable) enabled by default. See Ubuntu wiki [1] for more details.

Because of this, the following unit tests fail to compile:
Making check in memcheck
Making check in .
Making check in tests
Making check in .
Making check in amd64
/usr/bin/ld: fxsave-amd64.o: relocation R_X86_64_32S against symbol `vecZ' can not be used when making a shared object; recompile with -fPIC
/usr/bin/ld: final link failed: Nonrepresentable section on output
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
/usr/bin/ld: shr_edx.o: relocation R_X86_64_32S against undefined symbol `data' can not be used when making a shared object; recompile with -fPIC
/usr/bin/ld: final link failed: Nonrepresentable section on output
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
Making check in linux
Making check in amd64-linux
/usr/bin/ld: defcfaexpr.o: relocation R_X86_64_32 against `.text' can not be used when making a shared object; recompile with -fPIC
/usr/bin/ld: defcfaexpr.o: relocation R_X86_64_PC32 against symbol `malloc@@GLIBC_2.2.5' can not be used when making a shared object; recompile with -fPIC
/usr/bin/ld: final link failed: Bad value
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
Making check in none
Making check in .
Making check in tests
Making check in .
Making check in amd64
/usr/bin/ld: cmpxchg.o: relocation R_X86_64_32S against undefined symbol `rax' can not be used when making a shared object; recompile with -fPIC
/usr/bin/ld: final link failed: Nonrepresentable section on output
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
/usr/bin/ld: sbbmisc.o: relocation R_X86_64_32S against undefined symbol `in_b' can not be used when making a shared object; recompile with -fPIC
/usr/bin/ld: final link failed: Nonrepresentable section on output
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
/usr/bin/ld: fcmovnu.o: relocation R_X86_64_32S against undefined symbol `zzz' can not be used when making a shared object; recompile with -fPIC
/usr/bin/ld: final link failed: Nonrepresentable section on output
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
/usr/bin/ld: fxtract-fxtract.o: relocation R_X86_64_32S against undefined symbol `arg' can not be used when making a shared object; recompile with -fPIC
/usr/bin/ld: final link failed: Nonrepresentable section on output
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
/usr/bin/ld: looper.o: relocation R_X86_64_32S against symbol `arg' can not be used when making a shared object; recompile with -fPIC
/usr/bin/ld: final link failed: Nonrepresentable section on output
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
/usr/bin/ld: jrcxz.o: relocation R_X86_64_32S against undefined symbol `arg64' can not be used when making a shared object; recompile with -fPIC
/usr/bin/ld: final link failed: Nonrepresentable section on output
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
/usr/bin/ld: shrld.o: relocation R_X86_64_32S against undefined symbol `data' can not be used when making a shared object; recompile with -fPIC
/usr/bin/ld: final link failed: Nonrepresentable section on output
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
Making check in exp-bbv
Making check in .
Making check in tests
Making check in .
Making all in .
Making all in amd64-linux
Making check in amd64-linux
/usr/bin/ld: rep_prefix.o: relocation R_X86_64_32S against `.bss' can not be used when making a shared object; recompile with -fPIC
/usr/bin/ld: final link failed: Nonrepresentable section on output
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
/usr/bin/ld: fldcw_check.o: relocation R_X86_64_32S against `.data' can not be used when making a shared object; recompile with -fPIC
/usr/bin/ld: final link failed: Nonrepresentable section on output
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
/usr/bin/ld: complex_rep.o: relocation R_X86_64_32S against `.bss' can not be used when making a shared object; recompile with -fPIC
/usr/bin/ld: final link failed: Nonrepresentable section on output
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
/usr/bin/ld: clone_test.o: relocation R_X86_64_32S against `.bss' can not be used when making a shared object; recompile with -fPIC
/usr/bin/ld: final link failed: Nonrepresentable section on output
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
/usr/bin/ld: ll.o: relocation R_X86_64_32 against `.data' can not be used when making a shared object; recompile with -fPIC
/usr/bin/ld: final link failed: Nonrepresentable section on output
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status

A workaround is to pass CFLAGS="-no-pie" to configure.
However this needs to be fixed.


[1] https://wiki.ubuntu.com/SecurityTeam/PIE