diff --git a/daemon/container_operations.go b/daemon/container_operations.go
index 5df9640bb9a22..f4ccb14fdb9b0 100644
--- a/daemon/container_operations.go
+++ b/daemon/container_operations.go
@@ -1,3 +1,6 @@
+// FIXME(thaJeztah): remove once we are a module; the go:build directive prevents go from downgrading language version to go1.16:
+//go:build go1.19
+
 package daemon // import "github.com/docker/docker/daemon"
 
 import (
diff --git a/daemon/inspect.go b/daemon/inspect.go
index 915b9d810b183..179c7264c9e30 100644
--- a/daemon/inspect.go
+++ b/daemon/inspect.go
@@ -1,3 +1,6 @@
+// FIXME(thaJeztah): remove once we are a module; the go:build directive prevents go from downgrading language version to go1.16:
+//go:build go1.19
+
 package daemon // import "github.com/docker/docker/daemon"
 
 import (
diff --git a/internal/sliceutil/sliceutil.go b/internal/sliceutil/sliceutil.go
index 66d90f2dc9fd7..626bbf5bcb574 100644
--- a/internal/sliceutil/sliceutil.go
+++ b/internal/sliceutil/sliceutil.go
@@ -1,3 +1,6 @@
+// FIXME(thaJeztah): remove once we are a module; the go:build directive prevents go from downgrading language version to go1.16:
+//go:build go1.19
+
 package sliceutil
 
 func Dedup[T comparable](slice []T) []T {
diff --git a/libnetwork/endpoint.go b/libnetwork/endpoint.go
index fa53450868d84..d9c257dc68564 100644
--- a/libnetwork/endpoint.go
+++ b/libnetwork/endpoint.go
@@ -1,3 +1,6 @@
+// FIXME(thaJeztah): remove once we are a module; the go:build directive prevents go from downgrading language version to go1.16:
+//go:build go1.19
+
 package libnetwork
 
 import (