Diana Morant is the person that Pedro Sánchez and Ximo Puig want to be the new general secretary of the PSPV. But all the efforts made in recent days by the national leadership of the PSOE to make theirs a candidacy of integration, of consensus, capable of avoiding a scenario of confrontation, have failed. The Minister of Science and Universities, and former mayor of Gandía, is not going to have an easy task. The Valencian federation is going to hold primaries and she will lead one of the three candidates that will compete alongside those of the provincial secretary of Valencia and mayor of Mislata, Carlos Fernández Bielsa, and that of the provincial secretary of Alicante and national deputy, Alejandro Soler.
The PSPV, being faithful to its organic tradition, plagued by political corpses, returns to the internal battle that, once again, will have the militants as protagonists. They are the ones who, in a double round of primaries, will decide who should be the replacement for Ximo Puig, the man who has led this party for 12 years. Let us remember that in 2017, primaries were held in which Ferraz’s candidate, Rafael García, mayor of Burjassot, lost to Ximo Puig himself, who at that time was already president of the Generalitat Valenciana. Ferraz did not win the battle.
On this occasion, the primaries will be held with the PSPV in opposition in the main Valencian institutions. This information is fundamental, as it forces the three contenders to propose a speech that motivates the party to try to recover these same institutions in the 2027 elections. The PSPV must forge internal strengths that avoid beginning a long journey through the desert like the previous one that lasted 20 years, from 1995 to 2015. For this objective, strong leadership will be necessary, capable of weaving internal complicities.
Diana Morant is, a priori, the candidate who has the support of the PSOE structures, but this support is not a guarantee of victory. The first step will be to overcome the first round (two of the three candidates pass if none exceeds 50% of the votes) which seems, in this case, more than probable. The scenario may also become complicated if the other two candidates reach an agreement on mutual support in the second round if one of these two does not pass the first stage.
The minister is, without a doubt, the one who risks the most in this internal fight, given her membership in Sánchez’s executive. There will be no shortage of readings that associate her victory or defeat with that of the President of the Government. It also happens that the militants will be the ones to decide the successor, exactly what benefited Sánchez against Susana Díaz, against the “apparatus.” And it is already known that the primaries of a party are carried out by the devil. Diana Morant is the one with the best cards, but the game has only just begun.