He taught at the History Department at Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria, where he became a professor and Director of the Institute of African Studies from 1974-1977.
He took a leading part for some time in the politics of Nigeria and served on the Nigerian Senate from 1979–1983 during the Second Republic.
Akintoye is one of the current leading scholars on the history of the Yoruba people.
This work dispels the Middle Eastern and Arabia origins propounded by such scholars as the late Samuel Johnson (1846–1901) and also gave prominence to the works on the Pre-Oduduwa Period by Ulli Beier among others.
A reviewer, Wale Adebanwi, notes: "...this book directly contests and shifts th e focus of Yoruba history away from what many have called the Oyo-centric account of Samuel Johnson... Where Johnson avoids the creation myth that positions Ife as the sacred locus of Oduduwa's original descent and the orirun (creation-source), Akintoye, justifiably, restores Ile-Ife to its proper place as "ibi ojumo ti mon wa'ye" (where the dawn emerges)..."[6]