Diana Morant

Diana Morant Ripoll (born 25 June 1980) is a Spanish politician who has been Minister of Science and Innovation since 12 July 2021. She has been Secretary-General of the Socialist Party of the Valencian Country since 2014 and Mayor of Gandia (Valencia) from June 2015 until July 2021. She was also member of the Corts Valencianes, the regional assembly of the Valencia region, from July 2015 to May 2017. She started her political career in the Spanish Socialist Workers Party (PSOE) on 11 June 2011.

Life
Diana Morant was born in Gandia, Spain, on June 25 1980, the elder of two sisters. She studied at Abat Solà Middle School in Gandía and, later, she attended María Enríquez High School in Gandia. She studied Telecommunications Engineering at the Polytechnic University of Valencia (UPV), graduating in 2007.

After three years working as an engineer in the private sector, in February 2011, she was invited by José Manuel Orengo Pastor, who was Mayor of Gandía at that moment, to become a candidate of PSPV-PSOE, the Valencian branch of the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party, for Gandia in the Spanish local elections that were held on May 24th, 2011. She occupied the 5th position on the electoral roll. In those elections, PSPV-PSOE obtained 10 council seats and she was officially named councilor of the local government of Gandía on June 11th, 2011. During the 2011-2015 term, she was a member of the opposition in the city council.

In May of 2014, José Manuel Orengo, secretary-general of the PSPV for Gandia at the time, announced that he was resigning as the party's secretary-general. Diana Morant, the Secretary of Organization at the time, announced her candidacy to lead the party in Gandia. In June of 2014 she was elected Secretary-General of the Gandia socialist party.

In October 2014, Diana Morant took part in the PSPV's selection process for mayoral candidates. She was unopposed, so she was proclaimed the socialist party's mayoral candidate for the city of Gandia for the 2015 Spanish local elections.

In the municipal elections of 2015, the PP (the Spanish conservative party) won 12 seats in the council, the PSPV-PSOE 7, the coalition Més Gandia 5, and Citizens 1. Three weeks later, on 13 June 2015, at the plenary session, Diana Morant obtained the support of the councillors of the PSPV-PSOE, Més Gandia and the mayor of Ciudadanos, thus becoming mayor of Gandia, thereby ending four years of PP government. She resigned as mayor on 11 July 2021 after being nominated for the office of Minister of Science, Innovation and Universities by prime minister Pedro Sánchez.