Monkey urinates on Rupiah Banda, president of Zambia, during press conference

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Zambian President Rupiah Banda managed to keep his cool last week when a monkey sitting above him in a tree apparently urinated on him.

‘You (monkey) have urinated on my jacket,’ Banda told the animal, according to the New York Daily News. He then smoothly -- for one upon whom a monkey has just urinated -- continued his address to those assembled for the press conference.

‘Perhaps these are blessings,’ he mused as those around him laughed. (See video of the spectacle at itnnews’ YouTube channel.)

Banda studied at Wolfson College, a division of Cambridge University, and was once Zambia’s ambassador to the U.S. He has been Zambia’s president since his predecessor’s death last year and recently won a narrow reelection, running as the candidate for the ruling Movement for Multi-party Democracy (MMP) party. No word on the monkey’s political affiliations.

-- Lindsay Barnett