Charter Companies Flying to Cuba Thrive
Published: Tuesday, May 19, 2009 3:36 pm By: The New York Times - Damien Cave
MIAMI — The crowd of Cuban-Americans pressing against the airport ticket counter scorned those on the other side. Only a handful of American charter companies have landing rights in Cuba, and with the new White House policy letting Cuban-Americans visit relatives there as often as they want, ticket prices have become political. “I paid $600 for a 45-minute flight,” said Carelis Sabatela, in loud Spanish, before checking in with a cart of heavy luggage. “It’s very high, super excessive.” Like many in line, she called for more competition, but as the current boom in reservations shows, this is not a normal business. Who flies and how much they charge is intimately tied to the 50-year feud between Cuba and the United States. Experts describe these charter companies as byproducts of a dysfunctional back-and-forth that has not ended — and that now promises to provide millions of dollars in profit to a politically savvy few. “The system exists solely because the relationship between Cuba and the United States doesn’t exist in its normal form,” said John S. Kavulich II, a senior policy adviser for the U.S.-Cuba Trade and Economic Council, a nonpartisan group that tracks trade activity in Cuba. “You have an abnormal service environment directly because of abnormal relations.” Today’s charter companies began in the late 1970s during a period of warming relations, and most owners figured that their role would be temporary. The companies survived not just because Fidel Castro and the American embargo kept larger carriers out; many of the owners have also played both sides, deploying money and favors under the cover of dual identities that let them connect with Cuban leaders one minute, Americans the next. John Cabanas, of C&T Charters, is perhaps the least known but the most powerful owner in a group that includes Vivian Mannerud, who followed her father into the business after he was convicted in the 1980s of “trading with the enemy,” in part for taking four Pepsi machines to Cuba; and Francisco Aruca, owner of Marazul Charters, who sneaked out of a Castro-run prison dressed as a child,
