Abu Ahmed and the rest of his army in the People’s Democratic Republic of Maadi are up with the roosters and in the streets. Some are clad in overalls and rain boots, others in their ‘emmas and galabeyas.

Their weapon of choice: the water hose, which they wield in fulfillment of their duties at any cost — ‘til the last drop of water in the nation, if need be.

That hose is magic, a time machine of sorts, transforming Abu Ahmed and his comrades into schoolkids armed with water guns — running wild and out of control.

They hop from one car to the next, our aquamen do, making sure our cars shine bright like diamonds. Never mind that Rihanna didn’t have cars in mind — or that we live in Cairo, where a trip from my house to my mothers’ (a 15 minute drive) leaves my sparkly clean car covered in enough dust to serve as a canvas on which school children can leave me sweet messages.

As the good people at the nation’s water utility companies can tell us, the waste doesn’t stop there: Once the cars are washed, our friends turn their weapons on our dusty streets and sidewalks, filling holes in our uneven roads as if to make up for the lack of rain. The result? Wonderful water puddles through which cars can splash unapologetically, soaking pedestrians left and right. Day after day, the puddles erode the pavement, enlarging potholes that never seem to be fixed.

(If there’s one lesson we’ve learned in recent years, it’s that bridges are seemingly easier to build than roads are to pave. The last significant stretch of pavement to be resurfaced in Maadi, at least, was pre-2011.)

As a self-appointed member of the Water Waste Patrol, I do my best to keep order in my neighborhood — terrifying men quadruple my size as I urge them to drop the hose. Heck, I can extract a confession from some without lifting a finger.

“The hose is the holy grail of the perfect wash,” Abu Ahmed brags when I ask him why he’s using so much H2O. “The bucket or the cloth alone gives the car a depressed shine that shows I did my job half-heartedly.”

A few blocks over: “The streets need tarteeb (hydration) — water breathes life into our dead streets just like when you take a sip to revive yourself on a hot day. We never run out of water. We’re sons of the Nile River,” says Amm Salama, the king of moisturizing.

Amm Salama is absolutely right — the Nile breathes life into our nation. Without it, we would be pure desert. It provides water for drinking, fishing, agriculture — nourishing this great civilization that it created in the first place. The problem is that our ancestors would be rolling in their sarcophagi if they could see how we waste our bounty. The Pharaohs were mindful of their resources, treasuring the Nile like no one else. If Amm Salam had wasted water on the Volvos and Mercedes of their time, they’d have thrown him (not a virgin) into the river as a sacrifice.

State officials have been telling us for years that we’re in the midst of a crisis — an era of water poverty, generally defined as a per-capita share of water now less than 1k cubic meters per year. How bad is it here in Egypt? As the planet continues to warm, we have just 550-560 cubic meters per person per year — and it’s getting worse. Is it any wonder that the state is now spending bns to line canals? To move us to less water-intensive forms of agriculture? Or that we’re losing our collective [redacted] about the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam? Three-way talks between Cairo, Khartoum and Addis Ababa remain stalemated.

The price tag is huge: The state’s 20-year program to push into desalination, expand wastewater treatment, and move to modern irrigation methods is going to cost (at a bare minimum) USD 50 bn over 20 years.

The stakes are high: Water poverty and food security are two sides of the same coin. And as an import-reliant nation, we import as much as 54% of our “total” water needs — virtual water embedded in the commodities we buy on global markets.

The water deficit is stark, according to the ministry of irrigation and water resources: We need nearly 114 bn cubic meters of water a year, and our overall share from the Nile is no more than 55 bn, implying a deficit of more than 60 bn cubic meters.

And there’s just one thing we can do immediately (and at zero cost): Ban Abu Ahmed and his buddies from using water hoses. Make it illegal for shop owners to douse the sidewalks and streets in front of their shops. Crack down on gardeners who let hoses run for hours on tiny strips of land.

We wouldn’t be alone: From the United States to the United Kingdom, governments facing drought have implemented water patrols (and fines) to clamp down on banned forms of irrigation, overwatering, overspraying, and the hosing down of hard surfaces. And in nations of snitches, neighbors are being prompted to rat each other out if they catch someone breaking a ban.

The punishments? First-time violators usually receive a warning. In the UK, folks using water hoses during periods of bans face fines of up to GBP 1k.

The worst of it is, we have had similar regulations on our books — we just don’t enforce them. Years back, the governor of Cairo and local district council officials rolled up their sleeves and worked with other authorities to clamp down on the wasting of water. They combed streets for shop owners and residents mismanaging water. They trumpeted the daily number of violators they busted — and, inevitably, their campaign ran out of steam.

Consistency breeds results — and the on-and-off approach to addressing our nation’s water crisis is a testament to its miserable failure. The selective, partial, and inconsistent enforcement of the law is a chronic disease of our society. Fix that and we’ll kick [redacted], as my Pilates instructor would tell you.

Look, friends, you all know we’re not fans of new taxes. But we also tell you regularly that the best way to get rid of unwanted behavior is to tax it. The time has come for the authorities to ramp up what they charge everyone — every flat, every building — for water. The average household water bill in England and Wales was GBP 200 in the year ending March 2022. How much did you pay for water last year — if anything at all?

Sorry, guys. Nothing personal. Or as Billy Crystal as Dr Ben Sobel once said, “Don’t kid yourself, Jelly. It doesn’t get more personal than this.”

Don’t want to make our inflation problem worse? Talk to your own Abu Ahmed. Today.

As for me? I spoke with Abu Ahmed, bless him. And we made progress — of a sort. Now, he hoses down every car in our building — except mine, the black sheep of the block.

ANALYZE THIS is a regular Enterprise Weekend column by the Mother of the Resident 15 Year-old.