AN OIL worker freed after being held captive by a Nigerian militant group has relayed positive news to the family of a Merseyside man also held.

Robin Hughes said Matthew Maguire, 34, of Birkenhead, was “fit and well” and “still being held captive”.

He said: “The good news is that we have been able to give that information to Matthew’s family, which is important because information is so hard to come by over there.

“He is still being held captive. We haven’t heard anything to say he will be released, but we are hoping he will be.”

The two men were among 27 oil workers kidnapped when their oil supply vessel was hijacked on September 9. The majority of the crew were later released but Mr Hughes and fellow Briton Matthew Maguire remained hostages of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (Mend).

Mr Hughes, whose wife, Adina, and 16-year-old daughter, Elenice, live in Brazil, was handed over to military officials in Nigeria’s southern oil region on Sunday on health grounds.

Mr Maguire lives with his partner Emma Dean and children Ellie, 10, Charlie, eight, and two-year-old Matthew in Birkenhead.