The test suite assumes extensively that it is not being run as root - for instance, it expects to be able to chmod a-w a file and then have a subsequent attempt to modify that file be refused by the kernel. I doubt it is possible to find alternative ways to test some of the things that are taking advantage of those assumptions right now. It is tempting to have the test suite allocate an unprivileged scratch user ID if it detects root, but there is no clean way to do that and I think the buildd admins would hate me.
Unless you have a *really compelling* reason for wanting to do the build as root (and without DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=nocheck), therefore, I am going to wontfix this. If you do have a good reason, I'd love to hear it. zw -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-bugs-dist-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org