Special to WorldTribune.com

Kenya, a long-time target of Al-Shabab jihadists, has begun construction on a 435-mile border wall to keep the Al Qaida affiliated terror group from infiltrating from Somalia.

“Whatever it is going to cost us and whatever it will take, we are going to make sure that our country is safe,” Kenyan Vice President William Ruto said.

More than 400 people in Kenya have been killed by Al-Shabab terrorists in the past two years, including 148 who were slain in April at a Christian college.

Kenyan officials told Al Jazeera that the security wall will consist of brick, fences and observation posts, and will stretch from the northeast town of Mandera to Kiunga in the southeast.

Critics have called the wall an “exercise in futility” and say it is destined to fail.

“It is a monumental waste of taxpayers’ money,” said George Morara, vice chairman of the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights. “Where similar walls have been built or exist to keep out the so-called ‘undesirables,’ they have not been successful. Case in point, Israel’s wall to keep out the Palestinians has not stopped the attacks against Israel. They have only led to more creative ways of circumventing the barrier.”

David Anderson, professor of African History at the University of Warwick in the United Kingdom, said the wall was “a crazy idea” that will do nothing to prevent Al-Shabab from recruiting Kenyan youth.

“Are we going to keep Al-Shabab in [Kenya] or are we going to keep them out? The problem at this stage is inside Kenya,” Anderson told IRIN News. “The wall, I assume, is more intended with dealing with refugees, but it’s a ridiculous idea.”

  435-mile border wall, Al Qaida, Kenya building wall at border with Somalia to keep out Al-Shabab jihadists, William Ruto, WorldTribune.com