diff --git a/configure.ac b/configure.ac
index 44a040c..5242b6a 100644
--- a/configure.ac
+++ b/configure.ac
@@ -45,7 +45,8 @@ PKG_CHECK_MODULES(LIBOSMOGSM, libosmogsm >= 0.11.0)
 PKG_CHECK_MODULES(LIBOSMONETIF, libosmo-netif >= 0.4.0)
 PKG_CHECK_MODULES(LIBMNL, libmnl)
 dnl FIXME: bump to 1.10.0 once it's available on build slaves and remove workaround from osysmon_ping.c
-PKG_CHECK_MODULES(LIBOPING, liboping >= 1.9.0)
+dnl FIXME: debian8 provides 1.7.0, debian9 provides 1.9.0
+PKG_CHECK_MODULES(LIBOPING, liboping >= 1.7.0)
 
 dnl checks for header files
 AC_HEADER_STDC
diff --git a/debian/control b/debian/control
index 9439c3b..fc8aed7 100644
--- a/debian/control
+++ b/debian/control
@@ -11,7 +11,7 @@ Build-Depends: debhelper (>=9),
                pkg-config,
                libtalloc-dev,
                libmnl-dev,
-               liboping-dev (>= 1.9.0),
+               liboping-dev (>= 1.7.0),
                libosmocore-dev (>= 1.0.1),
                libosmo-netif-dev (>= 0.4.0),
 Standards-Version: 3.9.8