After months without an update on the actions the Virgin Islands government and Biwater must complete before their water purchase agreement takes effect, Communications and Works Minister Julian Fraser said during Tuesday’s House of Assembly sitting that both parties are working on these “conditions precedent.”

“Both the employer and the company are in the process of finalising the conditions precedent,” Mr. Fraser said, adding that a new reservoir for Sabbath Hill has been purchased and workers are clearing a track for the pipeline between Paraquita Bay and Sabbath Hill.

He later added that Biwater “has taken the decision that they will proceed with the project even before all the conditions precedent are completed.”

Water interruptions are an old problem that could continue until the Biwater project is complete, according to Mr. Fraser, who, in a statement given just after Premier Ralph O’Neal moved to adjourn the meeting and before he seconded the motion, told the House that he expects that if Biwater doesn’t fix the territory’s water and sewerage woes, “It’ll stay like this for the next 20 years.”

See the April 21, 2011 edition for full coverage.