Removing surefire plugin - maven

Question

I have the following parent POM:
<project xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xsi:schemaLocation="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0 http://maven.apache.org/xsd/maven-4.0.0.xsd">
<modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>
<groupId>my_group</groupId>
<artifactId>my_artifact</artifactId>
<version>0.0.1</version>
<packaging>pom</packaging>
<modules>
<module>../common-module</module>
</modules>
<properties>
<project.build.sourceEncoding>UTF-8</project.build.sourceEncoding>
<project.reporting.outputEncoding>UTF-8</project.reporting.outputEncoding>
<https.website>http://intosimple.blogspot.com</https.website>
<snapshot.version>0.0.1</snapshot.version>
</properties>
<build>
<plugins>
<plugin>
<groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
<artifactId>maven-compiler-plugin</artifactId>
<version>2.3.2</version>
<configuration>
<source>1.8</source>
<target>1.8</target>
</configuration>
</plugin>
</plugins>
</build>
</project>
And the corresponding child POM is as follows:
<project xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xsi:schemaLocation="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0 http://maven.apache.org/xsd/maven-4.0.0.xsd">
<modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>
<parent>
<groupId>My_group1</groupId>
<artifactId>my_artifact_1</artifactId>
<version>0.0.1-</version>
<relativePath>../base/pom.xml</relativePath>
</parent>
<artifactId>some_module</artifactId>
<properties>
<jdk.version>1.8</jdk.version>
<jacoco.version>0.7.5.201505241946</jacoco.version>
</properties>
<dependencies>
<!-- some packages here-->
</dependencies>
<build>
<finalName>my_artifact_1</finalName>
<plugins>
<plugin>
<groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
<artifactId>maven-compiler-plugin</artifactId>
<configuration>
<source>${jdk.version}</source>
<target>${jdk.version}</target>
</configuration>
</plugin>
<plugin>
<groupId>org.jacoco</groupId>
<artifactId>jacoco-maven-plugin</artifactId>
<version>${jacoco.version}</version>
<executions>
<execution>
<id>prepare-agent</id>
<goals>
<goal>prepare-agent</goal>
</goals>
</execution>
<execution>
<id>jacoco-check</id>
<phase>test</phase>
<goals>
<goal>check</goal>
</goals>
<configuration>
<rules>
<rule implementation="org.jacoco.maven.RuleConfiguration">
<element>BUNDLE</element>
<limits>
<limit implementation="org.jacoco.report.check.Limit">
<counter>LINE</counter>
<value>COVEREDRATIO</value>
<minimum>0.0400</minimum>
</limit>
</limits>
</rule>
</rules>
</configuration>
</execution>
<execution>
<id>report</id>
<phase>prepare-package</phase>
<goals>
<goal>report</goal>
</goals>
</execution>
<execution>
<id>post-unit-test</id>
<phase>test</phase>
<goals>
<goal>report</goal>
</goals>
<configuration>
<dataFile>target/jacoco.exec</dataFile>
<outputDirectory>target/jacoco-ut</outputDirectory>
</configuration>
</execution>
</executions>
<configuration>
<systemPropertyVariables>
<jacoco-agent.destfile>target/jacoco.exec</jacoco-agent.destfile>
</systemPropertyVariables>
</configuration>
</plugin>
</plugins>
</build>
</project>
Even though, there is no mention of surefire plugin, the effective POM somehow is getting that. Could it be coming from any dependency?
I doubt that surefire might be causing Jacoco to fail. I want to remove it completely. What is right way of doing it?