make does not accept options like -L /path/to/somewhere - these are arguments that need to be given to the compiler and make will not pass them on. You probably need to edit the Makefile appropriately.

Depending on the Makefile, it will often use a variable like CFLAGS, LIBS or LDFLAGS to pass extra options to the compiler. You can set these when you run make: LIBS=-lmylib LDFLAGS=-L/path/to/mylib make. This relies on the Makefile having been written to use such variables however, which one generated by a system like autoconf probably will, but one written by hand may not.