Argentina suspended all football matches in the country on Friday as a result of the assassination attempt on Vice President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner on Thursday night.
Three games in the country’s first division were called off, as were several in lower tiers, the reserve league and the women’s championship game.
Kirchner had returned home to a large crowd on Thursday night around 9 p.m.
A man approached Kirchner and was seen on video pointing a gun just inches from her face and appeared to pull the trigger — though the gun did not fire, according to The New York Times.
Kirchner was unharmed. A man has been arrested in connection with the attack.
Kirchner, 69, served as Argentina’s president from 2007-2015. Her husband, Nestor Kirchner, was also elected president from 2003-2007.
Fernandez also declared Friday a national holiday in Argentina to allow citizens to “defend life and democracy in solidarity with our vice president.”
After the attempted attack, messages of support poured in from political allies, such as Brazil’s presidential candidate and former leader, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, as well as Chile’s president, Gabriel Boric.
President Fernández declared a national holiday on Friday, so that Argentines of all political persuasions could unite in expressing their support for “life, democracy and solidarity with our vice-president”. He called for violence and hatred to be banished from the country’s political and media discourse.
Although economic crisis and political turbulence have buffeted Argentina repeatedly since the end of military rule in 1983, political violence is rare.
Political tension has been rising this year as inflation spirals towards 90 percent a year and the peso plunges in value on the black market.
