The Sunday Times said it had obtained millions of emails and other documents relating to alleged payments made by Mohamed Bin Hammam, then a FIFA executive member for Qatar.
It alleged that Bin Hammam, who is also an ex-Asian Football Confederation (AFC) president, used slush funds to pay cash to top football officials to win a "groundswell" of support for Qatar's World Cup bid.
Bin Hammam, who launched an abortive challenge against incumbent FIFA president Sepp Blatter, resigned from his FIFA and AFC posts in 2012, shortly before he was banned for life from football administration by the global governing body's ethics committee.
A report by FIFA chief investigator Michael Garcia, a top US lawyer, is to be finalised this year.
He is due to meet senior officials from the Qatar 2022 organising committee in Oman on Monday. But that meeting may now have to be postponed in light of the Sunday Times revelations.
FIFA and Qatar are already under pressure because the 2022 event will be held in the searing heat of the Qatar summer. FIFA's president wants the tournament held in the northern winter, for the first time, because of the problem.
The Sunday Times said Bin Hammam had made payments of up to $200,000 into accounts controlled by the presidents of 30 African football associations, and hosted hospitality events in Africa at which he handed out further funds, to get backing for Qatar's bid.
Bin Hammam also paid $1.6 million into bank accounts controlled by Jack Warner, the former vice-president of FIFA, $450,000 of which was before the vote for the World Cup, the Sunday Times said.
Warner was one of the 22 people who in 2010 decided to award Russia the 2018 World Cup and Qatar the 2022 tournament. He stood down in 2011.