Sorry, but when just a few of many countries had managed to barely setup an election process, but can't go on without some violent political crisis every 10 years, that is hardly a functional and sustainable democracy.
What does this have to do with Russians anyway? It's a general principle, which works all ways with all actors. The fact that some west-leaning ex-soviet states are hard on censorship and restriction of Russian media illustrates my point perfectly.
Americans loosing sleep over the idea that TikTok is a threat to national security is another good illustration of this general principle.
See, one really doesn't have to be an imperialist to assess how popularity-based systems can be hijacked in the era when internet and targeted propaganda exist.
I know imperialists prefer to see the small countries as brainwashed nations that need to be put back in their place and probably this is the reason Putoin is threatening this countries all the time, they show non brainwashed Russians that democracy works, that you can live better then during Stalin or Putin regime, that cooperation works.